THE  LIBRARY 

OF 

THE  UNIVERSITY 
OF  CALIFORNIA 

LOS  ANGELES 


\icardtlty 


LITTLE   PIERRE 


rue 


LITTLE  PIERRE 


<BY 


FT^ANCZ 


DODD-MEAD  fcf  COMPANY 


Copyright,  1920, 
BY  DODD,  MEAD  &  COMPANY,  INC. 


Printed  in  U.  S.  A. 


CONTENTS 

CHAPTER  PAGE 

I    INCIPE  PARVE  PUER,  Risu  COGNOSCERE 

MATREM 9 

II    EARLY  DAYS 20 

III  ALPHONSINE 26 

IV  LITTLE  PIERRE  GETS  INTO  THE  NEWS- 

PAPERS        29 

V    WHAT  CAME  OF  AN  ERROR  OF  JUDGMENT  32 

VI    THE  FATE  OF  GENIUS 37 

VII    NAVARINO 42 

VIII    How  IT  EARLY  BECAME  EVIDENT  THAT  I 

LACKED  THE  BUSINESS  SENSE       .     .  49 

IX    THE  DRUM 62 

X    COMEDY  WELL  HANDLED       ....  75 

XI    THE  LINT  MAKERS 83 

XII    THE  Two  SISTERS 91 

XIII  CATHERINE  AND  MARIANNE  ....  96 

XIV  THE  UNKNOWN  WORLD 101 

XV    MONSIEUR  MENAGE in 

XVI    SHE  LAID  HER  HAND  ON  MY  HEAD     .  116 
XVII    A  BROTHER  Is  A  FRIEND  BESTOWED  ON 

Us  BY  NATURE 128 

XVIII    OLD  MOTHER  COCHELET 143 

XIX    MADAME  LAROQUE  AND  THE  SIEGE  OF 

GRANVILLE 146 

XX    "'TWAS  THUS   THOSE    MONSTERS    FELL 

DID  GRIND  THEIR  TEETH"       .     .     .  156 

XXI    THE  PAPAGAY 163 

XXII    UNCLE  HYACINTHS 182 

XXIII  BARA 197 

XXIV  MELANIE 201 

5 

641808 


6  CONTENTS 

CHAPTER  PAGE 

XXV    RADEGONDE 209 

XXVI    CAIRE 215 

XXVII  THE  DAUGHTER  OF  THE  TROGLODYTES  .  222 

XXVIII     DRAMATIS  PERSONS 227 

XXIX  MADEMOISELLE  MERELLE       ....  236 

XXX    DIVINE  MADNESS 249 

XXXI  PIERRE'S  FIRST  ENCOUNTER  WITH  THE 

ROMAN  WOLF 259 

XXXII    BUTTERFLY  WINGS 269 

XXXIII  A  DIGRESSION 277 

XXXIV  THE  COLLEGIAN 281 

XXXV    MY  ROOM 294 


LITTLE  PIERRE 


LITTLE  PIERRE 

CHAPTER  I 
Indpe,  Parve  Puer,  Risu  Cognoscere  Matrem 

Y  mother  often  used  to  tell  me  a 
variety  of  things  connected  with  my 
entry  into  this  world  that  did  not 
strike  me  as  meriting  the  impor- 
tance she  attached  to  them.  I  paid 
no  very  great  attention  to  them  and 
they  'have  faded  from  my  recollection. 

"Quand  vient  1'enfant  a  recevoir, 
II  faut  la  sage-femme  avoir 
Et  des  commeres  un  grand  tas  .  .  ." 

It  may  certainly  be  affirmed,  if  the  stories  told 
me  were  true,  that  the  custom  referred  to  in  these 
lines  of  an  old  Parisian  rhymester  had  not  alto- 
gether fallen  into  desuetude  in  the  days  when  the 
reign  of  King  Louis  Philippe  was  drawing  to  a 
close;  for  there  was  a  great  gathering  of  worthy 
dames  in  Mistress  Noziere's  bedchamber  to  await 
my  arrival  in  this  vale  of  tears.  It  was  April  and 
the  weather  was  chilly.  Four  or  five  of  the  neigh- 
bouring gossips,  among  them  Madame  Caumont, 

who   had   a   bookshop   hard   by,    Madame   Veuve 

9 


io  LITTLE  PIERRE 

Dusuel  and  Madame  Danquin,  kept  piling  logs  on 
the  fire  and  drinking  mulled  wine,  while  my  mother 
lay  on  her  bed  of  suffering. 

"Groan  away,  Madame  Noziere,  groan  all  you 
can,"  said  Madame  Caumont,  "it  will  ease  the 
pains." 

Madame  Dusuel,  not  knowing  what  to  do  with 
.her  daughter  Alphonsine,  aged  seven,  had  brought 
her  into  the  room,  from  which,  however,  she  kept 
hastily  thrusting  her  lest  I  should  dawn,  with  unbe- 
coming abruptness,  on  the  view  of  this  very  young 
lady;  for  that  would  have  been  a  most  unseemly 
occurrence. 

These  ladies  had  well-oiled  tongues,  it  seemed, 
and  cackled  away  quite  in  the  good  old  fashion. 
Madame  Caumont,  to  my  mother's  great  displea- 
sure, kept  telling  the  most  horrible  tales  of  the 
sinister  effects  of  the  "Evil  Eye."  She  had  a  friend 
who,  when  she  was  in  an  interesting  condition,  met 
a  legless  woman  holding  a  laundry  iron  in  each 
hand  and  begging  alms  of  the  passers-by.  That 
friend's  child  was  born  without  legs.  She  herself, 
when  she  was  expecting  her  daughter  Noemi,  was 
frightened  by  a  hare  which  rushed  in  between  her 
legs;  and,  behold,  Noemi  was  born  with  pointed  ears 
that  waggled  I 

At  midnight  the  pains  ceased  and  matters  were 
at  a  standstill.  It  was  an  anxious  time,  particu- 
larly as  my  mother  had  previously  had  a  still-born 


LITTLE  PIERRE  u 

child  and  nearly  lost  her  life.  All  the  women  in- 
sisted on  giving  advice.  Madame  Mathias,  the  old 
servant,  was  at  her  wits'  end.  My  father  came 
in  every  five  minutes  looking  very  pale  and  went 
out  again  without  a  word.  Himself  a  clever  and 
capable  practitioner — physician,  surgeon  and,  when 
need  was,  accoucheur — he  would  not  attend  his  own 
wife  in  her  confinement  and  had  called  in  his  con- 
frere, old  Dr.  Fournier,  who  had  been  a  student 
under  Cabanis.  During  the  night  the  pains  came 
on  again,  and  I  made  my  appearance  at  five  o'clock 
in  the  morning. 

"It's  a  boy!"  said  old  Fournier. 

Whereupon  all  the  gossips  exclaimed  with  one 
accord  that  they  had  declared  all  along  that  it 
would  be. 

Madame  Morin  washed  me  with  a  big  sponge  in 
a  copper  basin,  a  circumstance  which  recalls  the 
old  paintings  of  the  nativity  of  the  Virgin.  In  point 
of  fact  the  utensil  in  question  was  the  household 
preserving-pan.  Madame  Morin  informed  the  com- 
pany that  I  had  a  red  spot  on  the  left  hip  due  to  a 
longing  for  cherries  which  had  come  upon  my  mother 
in  Aunt  Chausson's  garden  before  I  was  born. 
Whereat  old  Dr.  Fournier,  who  had  a  great  con- 
tempt for  all  such  popular  superstitions,  remarked 
that  it  was  lucky  Madame  Noziere  had  kept  her 
desires  within  such  modest  limits  during  the  period 
of  gestation,  since,  if  she  had  allowed  herself  to 


12  LITTLE  PIERRE 

hanker  after  feathers,  trinkets,  a  cashmere  shawl, 
a  coach-and-four,  a  town-house,  a  country  mansion 
and  a  park,  there  wouldn't  have  been  skin  enough 
on  the  whole  of  my  poor  little  body  to  hold  the 
record  of  such  inordinate  ambitions. 

"You  may  say  what  you  like,  Doctor,"  said  Mad- 
ame Caumont,  "but  one  Christmas  Eve,  my  sister 
Malvina,  who  was  in  the  family  way,  was  seized 
with  an  irresistible  desire  to  stay  up  and  take  part 
in  the  revels,  and  her  little  girl " 

"Was  born  with  a  black  pudding  at  the  end 
of  her  nose,  wasn't  she?"  interrupted  the  Doctor. 
And  he  told  Madame  Morin  to  be  careful  not  to 
bind  me  too  tightly. 

Meanwhile  I  set  up  such  a  yelling  that  they  all 
thought  I  was  going  to  choke.  I  was  as  red  as  a 
tomato  and  unanimously  pronounced  an  ugly  little 
creature.  My  mother  asked  them  to  let  her  see  me. 
She  raised  herself  nearly  upright  in  the  bed,  stretched 
out  her  arms,  smiled  on  me  and  then  let  her  head 
fall  wearily  back  on  the  pillow  again.  Thus  it  was 
that,  for  welcome  into  this  world,  I  received  from 
her  pure  and  tender  lips  that  smile  without  which, 
the  poet  says,  a  man  is  unworthy  of  the  table  of 
the  gods  or  of  the  couch  of  the  goddesses. 

What  I  have  always  looked  upon  as  the  most 
notable  circumstance  about  my  birth  was  that  Puck, 
since  named  Caire,  came  into  the  world  at  the  same 
time  as  myself,  being  born  in  the  next  room  on  an 


LITTLE  PIERRE  13 

old  bit  of  carpet.  Finette,  his  mother,  though  her 
parents  were  nobodies,  had  plenty  of  brains.  M. 
Adelestan  Bricou,  an  old  friend  of  my  father's,  who 
was  a  liberal  and  an  ardent  reformer,  used  tri- 
umphantly to  quote  Finette  as  exemplifying  the  in- 
telligence of  the  lower  orders.  Puck  bore  no  re- 
semblance to  his  dark  and  fluffy  mother;  his  coat 
was  tan,  close  and  wiry,  but  it  was  from  her  that 
he  derived  his  common  manners  and  his  uncommon 
brain.  We  grew  up  together  and  my  father  was 
compelled  to  admit  that  his  dog's  intelligence  devel- 
oped more  rapidly  than  his  son's,  and  that,  after 
six  years  or  so,  Puck  was  in  much  closer  touch  with 
life  and  had  a  far  better  knowledge  of  nature  than 
little  Pierre  Noziere.  It  was  an  unwelcome  con- 
clusion for  him  to  come  to  because  he  was  my  father 
and  also  because  his  tenets  scarcely  permitted  him 
to  credit  the  lower  animals  with  any  portion  of  that 
superior  wisdom  which,  according  to  his  idea,  was 
the  exclusive  birthright  of  man. 

Napoleon,  in  his  St.  Helena  days,  expressed  sur- 
prise that  O'Meara,  being  a  doctor,  was  not  also 
an  atheist.  Had  he  seen  my  father,  he  would  have 
beheld  a  man  who  was  at  once  a  doctor  and  a  be- 
liever in  the  unseen  and,  as  such,  a  believer  in  a  god 
distinct  from  the  world  and  in  a  soul  distinct  from 
the  body. 

"The  soul,"  he  used  to  say,  "is  the  substance;  the 
body,  the  shadow  or  appearance.  The  words  them- 


14  LITTLE  PIERRE 

selves  tell  you  that.     Appearance  is  what  is  visible, 
and  substance  means  the  thing  hidden." 

Unfortunately  I  was  never  able  to  interest  ray- 
self  in  metaphysics.  My  mind  was  modelled  on  my 
father's,  but  after  the  manner  of  the  cup  that  the 
craftsman  moulded  on  his  mistress's  breast.  It  re- 
produced, in  intaglio  as  it  were,  all  its  soft  and 
rounded  curves.  My  father  regarded  the  human 
soul  and  its  destiny  as  sublime.  He  believed  it  was 
made  for  heaven  and  his  belief  rendered  him  an 
optimist.  Yet  in  the  ordinary  intercourse  of  life 
he  was  grave  and  sometimes  gloomy.  Like  Lamar- 
tine,  he  seldom  laughed,  had  no  sense  of  the  comic, 
could  not  tolerate  caricature  and  cared  neither  for 
Rabelais  nor  La  Fontaine.  Wrapt  in  a  sort  of 
poetic  melancholy,  he  was  indeed  a  child  of  the  age. 
He  felt  and  looked  the  part.  The  way  he  did  his 
hair,  the  clothes  he  wore,  were  in  harmony  with  the 
spirit  of  those  romantic  times.  The  men  of  that 
epoch  wore  their  hair  tumbled.  Doubtless  a 
skilful  twist  of  the  brush  imparted  this  neglige 
appearance  to  their  locks;  but  they  looked  as  though 
they  were  perpetually  fronting  the  tempest  and 
braving  the  blasts  of  Boreas.  My  father,  plain  and 
unaffected  as  he  was,  would  nevertheless  have  his 
hair  in  disorder  and  his  touch  of  melancholy.  Tak- 
ing my  cue  from  him,  I  became  just  as  pessimistic  and 
merry  as  he  was  optimistic  and  melancholy.  Instinc- 
tively I  went  contrary  to  him  in  everything.  After 


LITTLE  PIERRE  15 

the  manner  of  the  Romanticists,  he  took  pleasure  in 
the  vague  and  shadowy,  while  I  cultivated  a  love  for 
the  stately  moderation,  the  ordered  beauty,  of  classic 
art.  As  the  years  went  by,  the  contrast  between 
us  grew  more  marked.  But  though  it  made  con- 
versation a  little  difficult  for  us,  it  had  no  effect 
upon  the  warmth  of  our  regard  for  each  other. 
This,  then,  explains  how  it  is  that  I  owe  to  my  ex- 
cellent father  my  few  good  points  and  my  many 
bad  ones. 

My  mother,  though  her  milk  was  not  abundant, 
was  very  anxious  to  nurse  me  herself.  In  this  she 
was  seconded  by  old  Dr.  Fournier,  a  disciple  of 
Jean-Jacques,  and  she  gave  me  the  breast  with  a 
lively  joy.  My  health  throve  therefrom  and  I  have 
good  reason  to  bless  her  if,  as  many  folks  say,  our 
disposition  depends  on  the  milk  we  suck. 

My  mother  was  endowed  with  charming  intellec- 
tual gifts,  a  beautiful  and  generous  soul  and  a  diffi- 
cult temper.  Too  sensitive,  too  loving,  too  prone 
to  emotion  to  find  peace  within  herself,  she  found, 
she  said,  tranquility  and  contentment  in  religion. 
Sparing  of  outward  observances,  she  was  neverthe- 
less profoundly  pious  in  spirit.  A  strict  regard  for 
the  truth  compels  me  to  add  that  she  did  not  believe 
in  hell.  But  her  disbelief  was  founded  neither  in 
contumacy  nor  in  malice,  since  the  Abbe  Moinier, 
her  confessor,  did  not  refuse  her  the  sacraments. 
Though  she  was  naturally  disposed  to  gaiety,  a 


16  LITTLE  PIERRE 

joyless  childhood,  followed  by  household  cares  and 
the  anxieties  born  of  a  mother's  love  that  almost 
amounted  to  a  passion,  clouded  her  disposition  and, 
strong  as  she  was  by  nature,  affected  her  health. 
She  brought  sorrow  into  my  childhood  by  her  fits 
of  melancholy  and  her  storms  of  weeping.  Her  ten- 
derness, her  anxiety  for  me,  were  so  great  as  almost 
to  unbalance  her  reason,  which  in  all  other  matters 
was  so  firm  and  lucid.  She  would  have  liked  me 
never  to  grow  up,  so  that  it  might  always  be  easy 
for  her  to  press  me  to  her  bosom.  And,  though  she 
said  she  hoped  I  should  be  a  genius,  she  rejoiced 
that  I  lacked  brains  and  consequently  had  to  rely  on 
her.  Anything  that  seemed  to  promise  me  a  little 
freedom  or  independence  gave  umbrage  to  her.  She 
would  picture  to  herself  all  the  terrible  things  that 
might  befall  me  away  from  her  side,  and  if  I  came 
back  from  a  walk  a  little  late  I  would  find  her  with 
her  brain  in  a  whirl  and  panic  staring  from  her  eyes. 
She  praised  up  my  good  qualities  beyond  all  reason 
and  never  lost  an  opportunity  of  holding  them  up  to 
the  admiration  of  others.  This  was  very  painful  to 
me,  for  I  have  always  looked  upon  testimonies  of 
regard  which  I  did  not  deserve  as  a  cruel  humilia- 
tion. Still  worse,  however,  was  the  equally  exag- 
gerated view  that  my  poor  mother  took  of  my  faults 
and  shortcomings.  She  never  punished  me  for  them, 
but  she  made  them  the  subject  of  reproaches  uttered 
in  such  sorrowful  tones  that  they  nearly  broke  my 


LITTLE  PIERRE  17 

heart.  Times  without  number,  the  things  she  said 
were  calculated  to  make  me  think  I  was  a  great 
criminal  and  she  would  have  made  me  scrupulous  to 
excesss  had  I  not,  early  in  my  career,  drawn  up  for 
my  own  use  an  indulgent  rule  of  conduct.  Far  from 
experiencing  regret  at  so  doing  I  have  never  ceased 
to  pat  myself  on  the  back  for  it.  They  alone  are 
gentle  to  others  who  are  gentle  to  themselves. 

I  was  christened  at  the  parish  church  of  Saint- 
Germain-des-Pres.  My  godmother  was  a  fairy 
known  among  mortals  as  Marcelle.  She  was  lovely 
as  the  light  of  day  and  had  married  an  imp  named 
Dupont  whom  she  loved  to  distraction,  for  fairies 
adore  imps.  She  weaved  a  spell  over  my  cradle  and 
sailed  away  at  once  to  a  land  beyond  the  seas  in 
company  with  her  imp.  I  caught  sight  of  her  for 
one  fleeting  moment  when  I  was  on  the  verge  of 
manhood.  She  seemed  like  the  stricken  shade  of 
Dido  in  the  grove  of  myrtle,  like  a  ray  of  moonlight 
in  a  forest  clearing.  It  was  but  a  glimpse,  but  it 
left  within  the  chambers  of  my  memory  a  radiance 
and  a  perfume  that  faint  not,  nor  fade.  The  recol- 
lection I  have  of  my  godfather,  M.  Pierre  Danquin, 
is  of  a  more  commonplace  description.  I  can  see  him 
now,  short  and  fat,  his  grey  hair  all  curly,  his  eyes 
shining  kindly  and  keen  through  his  gold-rimmed 
spectacles.  His  corporation,  which  would  have  done 
credit  to  Grimod  de  la  Reyniere,  was  adorned 
with  a  satin  waistcoat  whereon  flowers  had  been  em- 


i8  LITTLE  PIERRE 

broidered  by  Madame  Danquin's  own  hand.  He 
used  to  wear  a  great  black  silk  cravat  that  went 
seven  times  round  his  neck  and  the  collar  of  his 
shirt  encircled  his*  florid  face  like  a  piece  of  white 
paper  wrapped  round  a  bunch  of  flowers.  He  had 
seen  Napoleon  at  Lyons  in  1815.  For  the  rest,  he 
was  a  liberal  in  politics  and  much  taken  up  with 
geology. 

It  was  in  one  of  the  streets  which  lead  down  to 
the  Seine  and  its  quays  that  a  child  was  born,  who 
even  now,  after  all  this  lapse  of  years,  cannot  tell 
whether  he  did  well  or  ill  to  come  into  the  world. 
Here,  too,  where  a  nameless  multitude  of  men  and 
women  were  living  out  their  dim,  inglorious  lives, 
there  dwelt  a  man  with  a  mighty  head,  rugged  and 
gaunt  as  a  block  of  Breton  granite,  whose  eyes,  deep 
sunken  in  their  hollow  sockets,  had  once  blazed  with 
a  quenchless  fire  of  which  there  now  survived  but  a 
faint  and  fading  glimmer.  This  old  man,  morose, 
infirm,  yet  proud  of  mien,  this  old  man  who  had  been 
the  glory  of  his  generation,  was  then  slowly  and 
sorrowfully  sinking  into  the  grave.  His  name  was 
Chateaubriand. 

Sometimes,  from  the  heights  of  Passy,  another 
old  man  used  to  come  down  to  stroll  along  these 
same  quays.  He  was  bald  save  for  a  few  straggling 
grey  hairs.  His  cheeks  were  full  and  ruddy,  he  had 
a  rose  in  his  buttonhole  and  a  smile  on  his  lips.  He 
was  just  as  bourgeois  in  appearance  as  the  other  was 


LITTLE  PIERRE  19 

aristocratic.  He  was  a  popular  song  writer  and  the 
passers-by  would  stop  to  take  a  glimpse  of  him. 
Chateaubriand,  the  Royalist  and  the  Catholic; 
Berenger,  the  admirer  of  Napoleon,  the  upholder  of 
the  Republic,  the  free  thinker — such  were  the  two 
signs  beneath  whose  influence  I  came  into  this  world. 


CHAPTER  II 

EARLY  DAYS 

[Y  earliest  memory  is  of  a  tall  hat, 
with  very  long  nap,  and  a  very 
wide  brim.  It  was  lined  with  green 
silk  and  the  upper  part  of  its  inner 
band  of  tan  leather  was  cut  into 
strips  bent  downwards  like  the 
leaves  of  a  closed  crown  save  that,  as  these  strips  did 
not  completely  join,  you  could  catch  a  glimpse, 
through  a  round  opening,  of  a  red  bandana  poked  in 
betwixt  the  leather  band  and  the  gold  stamped 
crown.  A  white-haired  old  gentleman  would  be 
shown  into  the  drawing-room,  holding  this  hat  in 
his  hands.  He  would  then  proceed  to  draw  from  it, 
in  my  presence,  the  red  silk  snuff-stained  handker- 
chief which,  when  unfolded,  exhibited  Napoleon  in 
his  grey  overcoat  on  the  top  of  the  Colonne  Ven- 
dome.  Then  the  old  gentleman  would  extract 
from  the  depths  of  the  crown  a  little  dry  cake 
which  he  slowly  raised  above  his  head.  It  was 
a  little  flat,  round  cake,  shiny  and  striped  on 
one  side.  I  used  to  stretch  out  my  hands  to 
catch  hold  of  it,  but  the  old  gentleman  would  not 
let  it  go  till  he  had  had  his  fill  of  amusement  at  my 


20 


LITTLE  PIERRE  21 

vain  efforts  and  the  plaints  of  my  frustrated  en- 
deavours. In  fine,  he  played  with  me  as  he  would 
have  done  with  a  little  dog.  And  I  fancy  that,  as 
soon  as  I  realized  this,  I  resented  it,  already  con- 
scious within  me  of  belonging  to  that  high-mettled 
race  that  tame  all  animals  to  their  will. 

These  cakes,  when  you  put  your  teeth  into  them, 
broke  as  it  were  into  sand  in  the  mouth,  but  this 
sand  was  soon  reduced  to  a  sort  of  sugary  paste  by 
no  means  unpleasant  despite  the  bitter  taste  of  to- 
bacco which,  now  and  again,  obtruded  itself.  I 
liked  them,  or  thought  I  did,  until  I  discovered  that 
they  came  from  an  old  bakehouse  in  the  Rue  de 
Seine  where  they  reposed  dejectedly  in  a  dubious 
looking  jar  of  greenish  glass.  I  thereupon  con- 
ceived a  disgust  for  them  which  I  failed  sufficiently 
to  conceal  from  the  old  gentleman,  who  grew  sad 
thereat.  I  learned  afterwards  that  the  old  gentle- 
man's name  was  Morisson  and  that  he  had  been  a 
surgeon-major  in  the  British  army  in  1815. 

One  evening  after  the  battle  of  Waterloo,  in  the 
Officers'  Mess,  the  talk  got  on  the  prominent  men 
who  had  been  killed.  As  the  deaths  of  various 
people  were  being  deplored,  M.  Morisson  broke 
in  saying: 

"There  is  one  death,  gentlemen,  you  have  over- 
looked, one  that  is  more  to  be  regretted  than  any, 
one  that  we  should  lament  most  bitterly  of  all." 


22  LITTLE  PIERRE 

Every  one  wanted  to  know  to  whose  death  he 
alluded. 

"Gentlemen,"  said  he,  "I  refer  to  the  death  of 
Promotion.  Our  victory,  by  terminating  Bona- 
parte's career,  has  put  an  end  to  the  wars  which 
brought  us  rapid  advancement.  Promotion  was 
killed  at  Waterloo;  let  us  mourn  its  passing,  gen- 
tlemen." 

M.  Morisson  resigned  his  commission  and  came 
and  settled  down  in  Paris,  where  he  married  and 
set  up  in  practice.  There  he  and  his  wife  were  both 
carried  off  by  cholera  in  1848. 

It  was  also  about  this  time  that,  coming  into  the 
drawing-room  one  day  holding  on  to  Madame 
Mathias's  apron,  I  saw  a  dark  man  there  with  big 
whiskers  (it  was  M.  Debas,  surnamed  Simon  de 
Nantua)  repairing,  with  a  paint  brush  soaked  in 
glue,  the  green  striped  wall-paper,  about  a  foot  of 
which  was  torn  and  hanging  down.  The  rent  dis- 
closed a  piece  of  coarse  canvas  with  a  great  hole  in 
it,  and,  behind  the  canvas,  a  darksome  cavity.  These 
things  impressed  themselves  upon  me  with  great 
vividness,  and  they  still  remain  strangely  distinct 
in  my  memory  though  so  many  other  sights  presented 
to  my  vision  in  those  far-off  days  have  utterly  faded 
from  my  recollection.  Doubtless  I  did  not  think 
much  about  the  matter  at  the  time,  not  having  ar- 
rived at  the  reflective  age.  But  some  time  after- 
wards, when  I  was  nearing  my  fourth  year,  and 


LITTLE  PIERRE  23 

had  sufficient  brains  to  reason  erroneously  and  suffi- 
cient education  to  misinterpret  phenomena,  I  con- 
ceived the  notion  that,  behind  this  coarse  canvas 
with  its  covering  of  striped  paper,  unknown  beings 
were  hovering  in  the  darkness,  beings  that  were  dif- 
ferent from  men  or  birds  or  fishes  or  insects ;  vague, 
shadowing  things  yet  cunning  withal  and  full  of  evil 
intent.  Thus  it  was  not  without  curiosity,  not  with- 
out terror,  that  I  used  to  pass  by  the  place  where  M. 
Debas  had  repaired  the  rent  in  the  paper,  a  rent 
that  still  remained  visible,  since  the  edges  of  the 
green  paper  had  not  been  so  thoroughly  joined  but 
that  you  could  just  catch  between  them  a  glimpse 
of  a  piece  of  newspaper  that  had  been  stuck  on  as 
a  foundation;  not  perhaps  aesthetic,  but  comforting, 
since  it  deprived  those  spirits  of  darkness,  those 
dim  sinister  creatures  of  two  dimensions,  of  the 
power  of  access  to  the  room. 

Once  upon  a  time  (as  Eastern  story-tellers  say, 
being,  like  myself,  doubtful  in  their  chronology)  one 
fine  day  in  my  fourth  year,  I  noticed  near  the  piano 
another  hole,  shaped  like  a  star,  in  the  green  wall- 
paper, through  which  you  could  see  a  few  threads 
of  packing-cloth  interlaced  across  a  black  hole  even 
more  fearsome  than  the  one  previously  stopped  up 
by  M.  Debas.  With  an  impious  daring,  worthy  of 
the  bold  race  of  Japhet,  I  put  my  eye  close  to  the 
opening  and  there  beheld  living  shadows  that  made 
my  hair  stand  on  end.  I  then  applied  my  ear  to  the 


24  LITTLE  PIERRE 

spot  and  heard  an  uncanny  murmur,  what  time  an 
icy  breath  passed  along  my  cheek,  all  of  which  con- 
firmed me  in  the  belief  that,  behind  the  wall-paper, 
there  existed  another  and  an  unknown  world. 

My  life,  at  this  period,  was  a  double  one.  Natu- 
ral, commonplace,  occasionally  even  wearisome,  by 
day,  it  became  supernatural  and  terrible  at  night. 
Round  about  my  little  bed,  wherein  my  mother  used 
*o  tuck  me  up  with  her  own  fair  hands,  there  used 
to  pass  by,  in  a  wild,  fantastic  rout,  yet  not  without 
rhythm  and  measure,  a  procession  of  little  mis- 
shapen, hump-backed,  crooked  personages  clad  in 
very  antique  fashion,  such,  in  fine,  as  I  have  since 
discovered  in  Callot's  engravings.  Certainly  I  had 
never  invented  them.  The  fact  that  Madame  Le- 
tord  dwelt  hard  by,  Madame  Letord  a  print-seller 
who  displayed  her  engravings  on  the  piece  of  waste 
land  now  occupied  by  the  ficole  des  Beaux-Arts,  ex- 
plains the  circumstance.  Howbeit  my  imagination 
played  its  part  too.  It  armed  my  nocturnal  perse- 
cutors with  spigots  and  squirts,  and  little  brooms  and 
divers  other  household  utensils.  This,  however,  did 
not  detract  from  the  gravity  with  which  they  filed 
past,  their  noses  blossoming  with  warts  and  bestrid 
with  round  barnacles.  Yet  they  were  in  a  great 
hurry,  withal,  and  appeared  not  to  notice  me. 

One  evening,  while  the  lamp  was  still  burning,  my 
father  came  and  stood  by  my  little  bed  and  gazed  at 
me  with  the  exquisite  smile  of  sad  hearted  men  with 


LITTLE  PIERRE  25 

whom  smiles  are  rare.  I  was  already  half  asleep 
as  he  quietly  caressed  the  palm  of  my  hand  hum- 
ming a  little  nursery  rhyme  of  which  I  caught  noth- 
ing save  the  words,  "I've  got  a  cow  to  sell."  And  I, 
not  seeing  any  cow,  inquired,  sensibly  enough, 
"Papa,  where  is  the  cow  you've  got  to  sell?" 

I  fell  asleep  and  saw  my  father  again  in  my 
dream.  This  time,  he  was  holding  a  little  red  and 
white  cow  in  the  hollow  of  his  hand.  It  was  quite 
lively  and  spirited,  so  much  alive  that  its  breath  was 
warm  to  me  and  it  smelt  of  the  cow-shed.  For  many 
nights  afterwards  I  saw  that  little  red  and  white 
cow. 


CHAPTER  III 

ALPHONSINE 

LPHONSINE  DUSUEL  was  seven 
years  older  than  I,  and  a  thin, 
weedy  creature.  She  had  greasy 
hair  and  a  freckled  face.  Unless 
I  am  very  far  wrong  these  charac- 
teristics afterwards  constituted  her 
most  inexcusable  defects  in  the  eyes  of  the  world. 
I  knew  that  she  had  others  not  so  serious,  such  as 
hypocrisy  and  spite,  which  were  so  much  a  part  of 
her  nature  that  they  almost  became  her. 

One  day  my  dear  mother  was  taking  me  for  a 
walk  on  the  quay  when  we  met  Madame  Dusuel 
and  her  daughter.  We  stopped,  and  the  two  ladies 
had  a  little  talk  together. 

"Oh,  the  pet,  how  pretty  he  is!"  exclaimed  Al- 
phonsine,  flinging  her  arms  round  me. 

Though  at  that  time  I  had  not  as  much  intelli- 
gence as  a  dog  or  a  cat,  I  was,  like  them,  a  domestic 
animal  and,  like  them,  I  loved  those  words  of  praise 
which  creatures  in  their  wild  state  despise.  In  an 
access  of  affection  which  touched  the  two  mothers' 
hearts,  dear  Alphonsine  picked  me  up,  pressed  me 
to  her  heart  and  smothered  me  with  kisses,  saying 

26 


LITTLE  PIERRE  27 

all  the  while  what  a  darling  little  fellow  I  was.  At 
the  same  time  she  was  busily  pricking  my  legs  with 
a  pin.  And  so  I  began  to  fight  like  fury,  punching 
and  kicking  Alphonsine,  yelling  and  shedding  floods 
of  tears. 

Beholding  this,  Madame  Dusuel  betrayed,  by  her 
silence  and  the  expression  in  her  eyes,  the  surprise 
and  indignation  she  felt  at  such  conduct.  My  mother 
gazed  at  me  in  sorrow  and  marvelled  how  she  could 
have  brought  so  unnatural  a  child  into  the  world, 
now  blaming  heaven  for  visiting  her  with  unmerited 
misfortune,  now  finding  fault  with  herself  for  having 
incurred  it  by  her  own  shortcomings.  At  last  she 
stood  silent  and  perplexed  before  the  insoluble  mys- 
tery of  my  perversity.  How  was  I  to  explain  it  to 
her,  however,  if  I  could  not  talk?  The  few  words 
which  I  was  able  to  babble  were  of  no  service  to  me 
in  the  present  crisis.  Planted  at  length  on  my  feet, 
I  stood  there  panting  and  tearful.  And  Alphonsine, 
bending  over  me,  wiped  my  eyes,  petted  me,  and 
pleaded  for  me: 

"He  is  such  a  tiny  little  fellow.  Please  don't 
scold  him,  Madame  Noziere.  I  should  be  so  sorry; 
I  am  so  fond  of  him." 

Not  once  only,  but  a  score  of  times  did  Alphonsine 
embrace  me  ecstatically  and  dig  pins  into  my  legs. 

Later  on,  when  I  could  talk,  I  denounced  her 
perfidy  to  my  mother  and  to  Madame  Mathias,  who 
had  the  care  of  me.  But  they  didn't  believe  me. 


28  LITTLE  PIERRE 

They  blamed  me  for  slandering  the  innocent  in 
order  to  palliate  my  own  misdeeds. 

It  is  a  long  time  ago,  now,  since  I  forgave  Al- 
phonsine  her  cruel  deceit,  and  even  her  greasy  hair. 
Nay  more,  I  am  grateful  to  her  for  having  vastly 
added,  when  I  was  but  two  years  old,  to  my  knowl- 
edge of  human  nature. 


CHAPTER  IV 

LITTLE    PIERRE   GETS   INTO  THE   NEWSPAPERS 


0  long  as  I  was  unable  to  read,  news- 
papers had  a  mysterious  attraction 
for  me.  When  I  used  to  see  my 
father  spreading  out  their  big 
sheets  covered  all  over  with  little 
black  signs,  when  passages  were 
read  aloud  and  connected  ideas  were  produced 
from  those  same  signs,  it  seemed  to  me  as 
though  I  were  a  party  to  some  work  of  magic. 
From  this  sheet  so  thin  and  covered  with  lines 
so  tiny,  lines  that  had  no  signification  in  my 
eyes,  there  issued  tidings  of  crimes,  disasters, 
adventures,  festivals — of  Napoleon  Bonaparte 
escaping  from  the  fort  of  Ham;  of  Tom  Thumb 
dressed  up  like  a  general;  of  the  stalled  Ox 
Dagobert  being  led  through  Paris;  of  the  murder  of 
the  Duchesse  de  Praslin.  All  these  things  were  con- 
tained in  a  single  sheet  of  paper,  all  these  things  and 
numberless  others  besides,  things  not  so  solemn  but 
more  homely,  whereby  my  curiosity  was  aroused. 
There  were  "Misters"  who  gave  blows  or  received 
them,  who  got  run  over  by  vehicles,  who  fell  off 

roofs  or  picked  up  purses  and  took  them  to  the 

29 


3o  LITTLE  PIERRE 

police.  How  came  it  that  there  were  all  these 
"Misters"  about  when  I  never  set  eyes  on  a  single 
one?  I  tried,  but  in  vain,  to  imagine  what  a  "Mis- 
ter" was  like.  I  asked  people  about  it,  but  never 
got  any  satisfactory  answer. 

In  those  far  distant  times  Madame  Mathias  used 
to  come  to  our  house  to  help  Melanie,  with  whom 
she  didn't  get  on  at  all  well.  Madame  Mathias  was 
grim,  hot-tempered  and  easily  ruffled,  but  she  took 
a  lot  of  interest  in  me.  She  invented  all  sorts  of 
subtle  devices  to  make  a  better  boy  of  me.  She 
pretended,  for  example,  to  discover  in  the  news- 
paper, under  "Paris  Day  by  Day,"  sandwiched  in 
between  an  "alleged  case  of  arson,"  and  an  acci- 
dent to  "Mr.  Duchesne,  labourer,"  an  account  of  my 
conduct  on  the  previous  day.  "Yesterday,"  she 
would  read,  "little  Pierre  Noziere  was  naughty  and 
would  not  do  as  he  was  told  in  the  Jardin  des 
Tuileries;  but  he  has  promised  not  to  behave  badly 
any  more." 

I  was  wide  enough  awake,  when  I  was  two  years 
old,  to  feel  a  certain  difficulty  in  believing  that  I 
was  mentioned  in  the  newspapers,  like  M.  Guizot 
and  Mr.  Duchesne,  labourer.  I  noticed  that 
Madame  Mathias,  who  could  read  the  news  of  the 
day,  a  little  stumblingly  perhaps,  but  without  having 
to  correct  herself  over  much,  used  to  stammer  in 
the  most  singular  manner  when  she  came  to  the 
items  which  had  to  do  with  me.  I  therefore  arrived 


LITTLE  PIERRE  31 

at  the  conclusion  that  they  were  not  printed  in  the 
paper  at  all,  but  that  she  used  to  make  them  up  as 
she  went  along,  without  being  quite  equal  to  the 
task.  In  short,  I  was  not  wholly  taken  in,  yet  it 
was  not  without  a  pang  that  I  renounced  the  glory 
of  figuring  in  print  and  I  preferred  in  my  heart  to 
regard  the  matter  as  doubtful  rather  than  to  pos- 
sess the  certainty  that  it  was  false. 


CHAPTER  V 

WHAT  CAME  OF  AN  ERROR  OF  JUDGMENT 

ERE  is  another  memory  gathered  up 
amid  the  twilight  of  those  far-off 
days.  A  little  thing,  perhaps,  but 
then  origins  always  have  for  us  the 
fascination  of  mystery  and,  as  we 
cannot  trace  the  well-springs  of 
human  thought,  it  is  at  all  events  interesting  to 
note  the  signs  of  the  dawning  of  intelligence 
in  a  child.  And,  if  there  is  nothing  singular 
or  exceptional  about  the  child,  it  is  all  the  more 
valuable  as  an  object  of  study,  inasmuch  as  it 
represents  in  itself  a  host  of  other  children. 
That  is  one  reason  why  I  am  going  to  relate  my 
anecdote.  Another  is  that  I  shall  be  pleasing  my- 
self mightily  in  the  process. 

One  day — I  cannot  express  myself  with  greater 
precision  than  that,  for  the  place  of  that  day  in  the 
order  of  time  is  lost  beyond  recall — one  day,  I  say,  I 
had  been  for  a  walk  with  Melanie,  my  old  nurse, 
and  when  I  got  home,  I  went,  as  usual,  to  my  moth- 
er's room.  There  I  noticed  an  odour  that  I  could 
not  identify  and  that  came,  as  I  afterwards  discov- 
ered, from  a  smoky  chimney.  It  was  not  pungent  or 

32 


LITTLE  PIERRE  33 

choking,  but  faint,  pervasive  and  sickly.  Neverthe- 
less it  didn't  annoy  me  much  for,  as  regards  the  ol- 
factory sense,  I  was,  in  those  days,  more  akin  to 
the  little  dog  Caire  than  to  M.  Robert  de  Montes- 
quiou,  the  poet  of  perfumes.  Now  it  chanced  that, 
while  this  unknown,  or  rather  unidentified,  odour 
was  titillating  my  inexperienced  nostrils,  my  dear 
mother  put  into  my  hand  a  sort  of  emerald  coloured 
stick,  about  as  long  as  a  dessert  knife,  but  ever  so 
much  thicker.  It  seemed  to  me  a  marvellous  delicacy 
invested  with  all  the  charm  of  the  unknown.  I  had 
never  before  seen  anything  to  come  near  it. 
"Taste  it,"  said  my  mother,  "it's  very  nice." 
And  it  was.  When  you  bit  it,  the  stem  split  up 
into  little  sugary  splinters  that  had  a  flavour  that 
was  undeniably  pleasant  and  more  delicate  than 
any  of  the  sweets  and  sugar-stuffs  I  had  tasted  up 
to  then. 

The  sweetness  of  this  plant  was  such  that  I  fell 
a-dreaming  of  the  fruits  of  that  land  where  rivers 
of  gooseberry  syrup  flow  through  rocks  of  caramel, 
though  truth  to  tell  my  belief  in  the  Land  of  Co- 
cagne  was  no  greater  than  Virgil's  in  those  Elysian 
Fields  belauded  of  the  Greeks: 

"Quamvis  etystos  miretur  Gracia  campos" 

but,  like  Virgil,  I  loved  tales  of  enchantment,  and 
my  mind  was  filled  with  wonder,  for  I  did  not  know, 
in  those  days,  what  the  confectioners  do  to  a  stalk 


34  LITTLE  PIERRE 

of  angelica  to  render  it  so  pleasant  to  the  palate. 
For  this  highly  delectable  rod  was  nothing  else  than 
a  piece  of  angelica  given  to  my  dear  mother  by  Ma- 
dame Caumont,  who'had  had  a  whole  boxful  sent  her 
from  Niort. 

Coming  in  a  few  days  later  from  my  usual  walk 
with  Melanie,  my  nurse,  I  noticed  in  my  mother's 
room  the  same  peculiar  sickly  smell  which  I  had 
perceived  when  I  saw  angelica  for  the  first  time  and 
which  I  therefore  took  to  be  the  smell  of  angelica. 

I  kissed  my  mother  with  ceremonious  punctilio. 
She  asked  me  if  I  had  enjoyed  my  walk,  and  I  said 
I  had;  if  I  had  worried  Melanie  too  much,  and  I 
said  I  hadn't.  Having  thus  performed  my  duties  as 
a  son,  I  waited  for  my  mother  to  give  me  a  piece 
of  angelica.  As,  however,  she  had  taken  up  her 
needle-work  again  and  gave  no  sign  of  performing 
the  pleasing  act  for  which  I  was  waiting,  I  decided 
to  make  a  request  for  my  piece  of  angelica,  which 
I  did,  though  not  without  reluctance,  so  great  was 
the  delicacy  of  my  sentiments.  Mamma  looked  up 
from  her  work,  with  an  air  of  some  surprise  and 
said  she  hadn't  any. 

Unwilling  to  suspect  her  of  telling  a  lie,  however 
trifling  a  one,  I  told  myself  she  was  joking  and 
that  she  was  putting  off  the  appeasement  of  my  long- 
ing, either  because  she  wanted  to  render  it  the 
greater  or  because  she  was  indulging  in  the  bad 


LITTLE  PIERRE  35 

habit  grown-up  people  have  of  deriving  amusement 
from  the  impatience  of  dogs  and  children. 

I  urged  her  to  give  me  my  piece  of  angelica.  She 
replied,  a  second  time,  that  she  had  no  angelica  and 
clearly  she  intended  her  reply  to  be  final.  Relying, 
alas,  on  the  testimony  of  my  senses  and  on  the 
verdict  of  my  reasoning  faculty,  I  answered  with  as- 
surance that  there  was  angelica  somewhere  in  the 
room  because  I  could  smell  it. 

The  history  of  Science  abounds  in  examples  of 
similar  faulty  deductions,  and  the  world's  greatest 
geniuses  have  often  been  misled  in  the  same  man- 
ner as  little  Pierre  Noziere.  That  little  person 
ascribed  to  one  substance  a  certain  property  that 
belonged  to  another.  In  physics  and  chemistry 
there  are  laws  reposing  on  foundations  just  as  false, 
laws  that  are  respected  and  will  go  on  being  re- 
spected till  time  at  last  brings  about  their  abroga- 
tion. 

These  reflections  did  not  suggest  themselves  to 
my  mother's  mind.  She  merely  shrugged  her  shoul- 
ders and  told  me  I  was  a  little  silly.  That  was  too 
much  for  me.  I  told  her  I  was  not  a  little  silly, 
that  there  was  angelica  there  because  I  could  smell 
it  and  that  it  was  not  seemly  for  a  mamma  to  tell 
falsehoods  to  her  little  boy.  On  hearing  this  re- 
proach, my  mother  gazed  at  me  with  an  expression 
of  profound  and  sorrowful  surprise.  I  was  sud- 
denly convinced,  when  I  saw  this  look  in  her  eyes, 


36  LITTLE  PIERRE 

that  my  dear  mamma  had  not  deceived  me  and 
that,  despite  the  evidence  of  my  senses,  there  was 
no  angelica  in  the  house. 

And  so,  on  that  occasion,  my  heart  came  to  the 
rescue  of  my  reason.  I  would  fain  draw  the  con- 
clusion that  we  should  always  regulate  our  actions 
according  to  the  dictates  of  our  heart.  That  would 
be  the  moral  of  the  story  and  all  affectionate  souls 
would  welcome  it.  But  the  truth  must  be  told,  even 
if  it  causes  disappointment.  The  heart  can  err  as 
well  as  the  intellect;  its  errors  are  no  less  ruinous 
and  it  is  more  difficult  to  escape  from  them,  by  rea- 
son of  the  honey  that  besmears  their  meshes. 


CHAPTER  VI 

THE  FATE  OF  GENIUS 

ENIUS  is  fated  to  meet  with  injus- 
tice and  contempt,  a  truth  whereof 
I  early  made  probation.  When  I 
was  four,  I  used  to  be  an  ardent 
draughtsman.  Nevertheless  I  did 
not  essay  to  depict  all  the  objects 
that  presented  themselves  to  my  view;  it  only  por- 
trayed soldiers.  If  the  truth  must  be  told,  I  did  not 
draw  them  according  to  nature.  Nature  is  complex 
and  does  not  lend  herself  to  easy  imitation.  Nor  did 
I  draw  them  according  to  the  coloured  prints  which 
they  produce  at  fipinal  and  which  I  used  to  buy  at 
a  halfpenny  apiece.  These  likewise  exhibited  a  su- 
per-abundance of  detail  through  which  I  should 
never  have  found  my  way.  I  decided  to  take  as  my 
model  the  simplified  recollection  of  those  same 
prints.  My  soldiers  had  a  round  "O"  for  a  head, 
a  line  for  the  body  and  a  line  for  each  arm  and 
leg.  A  line  with  a  crook  in  it,  like  a  streak  of 
lightning,  represented  the  rifle  with  bayonet  fixed, 
and  it  was  eminently  expressive.  I  did  not  fit  the 
shako  down  on  to  the  head.  I  placed  it  just  on 

the  top  in  order  to  demonstrate  my  scientific  knowl- 

37 


38  LITTLE  PIERRE 

edge  of  the  subject  and  to  display  at  once  the 
shape  of  the  head  and  that  of  the  headgear.  I  drew 
a  large  number  after  this  style,  a  style  common  to 
all  children's  drawings.  They  were  skeletons,  if 
you  will,  and  very  sketchy  ones  at  that.  But,  such 
as  they  were,  I  deemed  my  soldiers  very  passably 
well  executed.  I  drew  them  in  pencil,  copiously  wet- 
ting the  point  to  make  it  mark  the  better.  I  would 
rather  have  used  a  pen,  but  ink  was  not  allowed 
me  for  fear  I  should  make  a  mess.  Nevertheless 
I  was  pleased  with  my  handiwork  and  considered 
myself  a  person  of  talent.  I  was  destined  in  no 
long  time  to  astonish  even  myself. 

One  evening,  one  memorable  evening,  I  was  busy 
drawing  on  the  dining-room  table  which  Melanie 
had  just  cleared.  The  lamp,  with  its  green  shade 
like  a  Chinaman's  hat,  shed  a  warm  glow  upon  my 
paper.  I  had  already  drawn  five  or  six  soldiers 
after  my  customary  method,  which  I  practised  with 
facility,  when,  all  of  a  sudden,  I  was  visited  with 
a  flash  of  genius.  I  conceived  the  idea  of  repre- 
senting arms  and  legs  not  by  a  single  line  but  by 
two  parallel  lines.  I  thus  achieved  a  result  that 
conveyed  a  striking  semblance  of  reality.  It  was 
the  living  thing.  I  gazed  at  it  in  delight.  Daeda- 
lus, when  he  created  his  walking  statues,  was  not 
more  pleased  with  his  handiwork  than  I.  True,  I 
might  have  asked  myself  whether  I  was  the  first 
to  think  of  so  pleasing  a  device  and  whether  I  had 


LITTLE  PIERRE  39 

not  already  seen  examples  of  it.  I  asked  myself  no 
such  questions;  I  asked  myself  no  questions  at 
all,  but,  with  staring  eyes  and  protruding  tongue, 
I  sat  gazing  like  one  dazed  at  what  I  had  done. 
And  then,  since  it  is  the  nature  of  artists  to  hold 
up  their  works  to  the  admiration  of  mankind,  I  went 
over  to  my  mother  who  was  reading  a  book,  and 
extending  my  scrawl  before  her  eyes,  exclaimed: 

"Look!" 

Seeing  that  she  was  paying  no  attention  to  what 
I  was  showing  her,  I  laid  my  soldiers  on  the  page 
that  she  was  reading. 

She  was  patience  itself. 

"It's  very  nice,"  she  said  gently,  but  in  a  voice 
which  showed  she  did  not  adequately  appreciate  the 
revolution  I  had  just  effected  in  the  art  of  drawing. 

"Mamma,  look!"   I  repeated  again  and  again. 

"Yes,  I  see,  very  nice,  now  run  away." 

"No,  you  don't  see,  mamma,"  I  said,  endeavour- 
ing to  snatch  away  the  book  that  was  diverting  her 
attention  from  my  masterpiece. 

She  forbade  me  to  touch  the  book  with  my  dirty 
hands. 

"But  you're  not  looking!"  I  cried  in  desperation. 

She  would  not  deign  to  take  any  further  notice, 
and  ordered  me  to  be  quiet. 

Exasperated  by  an  attitude  so  blind  and  so  un- 
just, I  stamped  my  feet,  burst  out  crying  and  tore 
my  masterpiece  to  shreds. 


40  LITTLE  PIERRE 

"How  excitable  the  child  is,"  said  my  mother  with 
a  sigh  as  she  led  me  away  to  bed. 

I  was  a  prey  to  dark  despair.  For  just  ima-gine! 
After  having  given  an  immense  impetus  to  the  arts, 
after  creating  a  prodigiously  effective  means  of  por- 
traying life,  all  I  got  in  the  way  of  recompense 
and  glory  was — to  be  sent  to  bed! 

Shortly  after  this  reverse,  I  suffered  another  one 
that  inflicted  a  wound  no  less  cruel.  It  befell  thus: 
my  mother  had  taught  me  pretty  soon  to  form  my 
letters  with  tolerable  skill.  Being  able  to  write 
a  little,  I  thought  there  was  nothing  to  prevent 
my  composing  a  book  and  so,  beneath  the  eye  of 
my  dear  mamma,  I  set  my  hand  to  a  little  moral 
and  theological  treatise  which  I  began  thus,  "What  is 
God  .  .  ."  and  forthwith  I  took  it  to  my  mother 
to  ask  her  if  that  was  right.  My  mother  replied 
that  it  was  quite  right  except  that  a  note  of  inter- 
rogation was  needed  at  the  end  of  the  sentence. 
I  asked  her  what  a  note  of  interrogation  was. 

"A  note  of  interrogation,"  said  my  mother,  "is 
a  sign  used  to  signify  that  one  is  asking  a  question. 
It  is  placed  at  the  end  of  every  interrogative  sen- 
tence. You  should  put  a  note  of  interrogation  here 
because  you  ask,  "What  is  God?" 

My  answer  was  noble. 

"I  am  not  asking,"  I  said  proudly,  "I  know." 

"But  you  are  asking,  dear,"  she  replied. 

A  score  of  times  I  repeated  that  I  was  not  ask- 


LITTLE  PIERRE  41 

ing  because  I  knew,  and  I  flatly  refused  to  add  that 

• 

note  of  interrogation  which  seemed  to  me  to  be 
merely  a  mark  of  ignorance. 

My  mother  upbraided  me  severely  for  my  ob- 
stinacy and  said  I  was  nothing  more  nor  less  than 
a  silly  little  boy.  Thereat  my  amour-propre  as 
a  writer  was  wounded  and  I  replied  with  some  im- 
pertinent remark  for  which  I  was  duly  punished. 

I  have  changed  a  great  deal  since  then.  I  never 
refuse  now  to  put  notes  of  interrogation  in  the  places 
where  it  is  customary  to  employ  them.  I  am  sorely 
tempted  indeed  to  add  very  big  ones  after  everything 
I  write,  or  say,  or  think.  Perhaps,  were  she  living 
now,  my  poor  mother  would  say  I  use  too  many. 


CHAPTER  VII 

NAVARINO 

S  far  back  as  I  could  remember  I  had 
known  Madame  Laroque,  who, 
with  her  daughter,  occupied  a  little 
flat  at  the  other  end  of  our  court- 
yard. She  was  a  little  old  lady 
from  Normandy,  the  widow  of  a 
Captain  in  the  Imperial  Guards.  All  her  teeth  had 
gone  and  her  soft  lips  were  tightly  drawn  in  over  her 
gums;  but  her  cheeks  were  round  and  ruddy  as  the 
apples  of  her  native  country.  Having  no  idea  of  the 
instability  of  Nature  and  the  transience  of  material 
things,  I  regarded  her  as  coeval  with  the  earliest 
period  of  the  world  and  endowed  with  an  imperish- 
able old  age.  From  my  mother's  room  you  could 
see  Madame  Laroque's  window  festooned  with  nas- 
turtiums, and  on  the  sill  of  it  her  parrot  swung  to 
and  fro  on  its  perch,  trolling  forth  snatches  of  ribald 
songs  and  patriotic  ballads.  He  had  been  brought 
from  the  East  Indies  in  1827  and  had  been  chris- 
tened Navarino,  in  memory  of  the  naval  victory 
gained  by  the  combined  fleets  of  France  and  Eng- 
land over  the  Turks,  the  news  of  which  reached 
Paris  on  the  day  of  his  arrival.  Madame  Laroque 


LITTLE  PIERRE  43 

petted  him  like  a  baby,  and  put  him  in  the  window 
every  morning  in  order  that  the  old  fellow  might 
enjoy  the  bustle  and  animation  of  the  courtyard. 
Of  a  truth,  I  cannot  make  out  what  sort  of  pleas- 
ure the  old  Yankee  derived  from  looking  at  Au- 
guste  washing  M.  Bellaguet's  carriage  or  the  aged 
Alexandre  pulling  up  the  grass  that  grew  between 
the  paving  stones;  but  in  point  of  fact  he  seemed 
scarcely  at  all  dispirited  from  his  long  exile.  With- 
out claiming  to  read  what  things  were  in  his  mind, 
one  might  have  supposed  that  he  was  delighting  in 
his  strength,  and  he  was  indeed  an  animal  of  sin- 
gular toughness.  When  his  little  grey  claws  closed 
round  a  piece  of  wood,  he  would  tear  it  to  shreds 
with  his  beak  in  less  than  no  time. 

I  have  always  been  fond  of  animals;  but  in 
those  days  they  inspired  me  with  veneration  and  a 
sort  of  religious  fear.  I  had  a  notion  that  they  were 
possessed  of  a  more  unerring  intelligence  than  my 
own  and  a  deeper  understanding  of  Nature.  The 
poodle,  Zerbin,  always  seemed  to  me  to  compre- 
hend things  that  were  beyond  my  ken  and  our  beau- 
tiful Angora,  Sultan  Mahmud,  who  understood  the 
language  of  birds,  I  used  to  look  upon  as  a  mys- 
terious spirit  endowed  with  the  power  of  reading 
the  future.  My  mother  one  day  took  me  to  the 
Louvre,  where,  in  the  Egyptian  galleries,  I  saw  the 
mummies  of  domestic  animals  swathed  in  bandages 
and  covered  with  aromatics.  "The  Egyptians,"  she 


44  LITTLE  PIERRE 

told  me,  "adored  them  as  divinities  and,  when  they 
died,  carefully  embalmed  them." 

I  do  not  know  what  ideas  the  ancient  Egyptians 
entertained  concerning  the  ibis  and  the  cat;  I  do  not 
know  whether,  as  some  people  hold  nowadays,  ani- 
mals were  the  first  gods  worshipped  by  men;  but  I 
came  very  near  to  ascribing  supernatural  powers  to 
Sultan  Mahmud  and  to  Zerbin,  the  poodle.  That 
which  rendered  them  most  marvellous  in  my  eyes 
was  that  they  appeared  to  me  in  my  sleep  and 
held  converse  with  me.  One  night,  in  a  dream,  I 
beheld  Zerbin  scratch  away  at  the  ground  and  pres- 
ently unearth  a  hyacinth  bulb. 

"This,"  he  said,  "is  what  little  children  are  like 
in  the  Earth  before  they  are  born;  they  unfold  like 
flowers." 

So,  you  see,  I  loved  animals.  I  admired  their 
wisdom  and  plied  them  with  questions  somewhat 
anxiously  during  the  day  so  that  they  should  come 
to  me  by  night  and  instruct  me  in  natural  philos- 
ophy. Birds  were  by  no  means  excluded  from  my 
friendship  and  from  my  veneration.  I  would  have 
cherished  Navarino  with  filial  affection;  I  would  have 
bestowed  unnumbered  tokens  of  solicitude  and  re- 
gard on  this  aged  Cacique;  I  would  have  become 
his  docile  disciple,  if  only  he  would  have  let  me. 
But  he  would  not  suffer  me  so  much  as  to  look  at 
him.  Whenever  I  drew  near  he  would  swing  im- 
patiently on  his  perch,  ruffle  up  the  feathers  on  his 


LITTLE  PIERRE  45 

neck,  stare  me  full  in  the  face  with  eyes  of  fire, 
open  his  beak  menacingly  and  display  a  black  tongue 
as  thick  as  a  haricot  bean.  I  should  have  liked  to 
know  the  cause  of  his  unfriendliness.  Madame  La- 
roque  ascribed  it  to  the  circumstance  that,  when 
I  was  quite  little,  and  before  I  was  able  to  walk, 
I  used  to  insist  on  being  carried  up  to  his  perch, 
stretched  out  my  baby  fingers  to  touch  his  eyes  that 
blazed  like  rubies  and  howled  shrilly  because  I  could 
not  reach  them.  She  loved  her  parrot  and  tried 
to  make  excuses  for  him.  But  who  would  have 
credited  the  existence  of  so  rooted  and  tenacious  a 
resentment? 

Well,  whatever  its  cause,  Navarino's  hostility 
seemed  to  me  both  cruel  and  unjust.  Anxious  to 
regain  the  good  graces  of  this  puissant  yet  fear- 
some being,  I  deemed  that  gifts  might  appease  him 
and  that  an  offering  of  sugar  might  prove  accept- 
able in  his  eyes.  In  contravention  of  my  mother's 
express  injunctions,  I  opened  the  cupboard  of  the 
side-board  in  the  dining-room  and  selected  the  finest 
and  most  attractive  looking  knob  in  the  sugar-basin ; 
for  it  must  here  be  observed  that,  in  those  days, 
sugar  was  not  broken  up  by  machinery  as  it  is  now. 
Housekeepers  used  to  buy  it  in  the  loaf  and,  in 
our  family,  the  aged  Melanie,  armed  with  a  ham- 
mer and  an  old  broken  knife  minus  its  handle,  used 
to  break  it  up  into  pieces  of  various  shapes  and 
sizes,  scattering  an  abundance  of  splinters  in  the 


46  LITTLE  PIERRE 

process,  after  the  manner  of  a  geologist  chipping 
off  samples  of  ore  from  the  solid  rock.  Nor  must 
I  omit  to  add  that  sugar  was  very  dear  then.  With 
my  heart  filled  with  peace  and  goodwill,  my  offer- 
ing safely  stowed  in  the  pocket  of  my  pinafore,  I 
proceeded  to  Madame  Laroque's  apartment  and 
found  Navarino  at  his  window.  He  was  crack- 
ing grains  of  hemp-seed  with  an  air  of  leisurely  non- 
chalance. Deeming  the  moment  opportune,  I  held 
out  the  lump  of  sugar  to  the  aged  chieftain.  He 
did  accept  the  proffered  gift.  He  looked  at  me  for 
a  long  time  sideways,  in  silent  immobility;  then  sud- 
denly swooped  down  on  my  finger  and  bit  at  it.  The 
blood  began  to  flow. 

Madame  Laroque  has  often  told  me  that,  as  soon 
as  I  beheld  the  colour  of  my  blood,  I  uttered  the 
most  terrific  shrieks,  wept  copiously  and  asked  if 
I  should  die.  I  have  always  been  loath  to  accept 
her  version  of  the  story.  All  the  same,  it  is  pos- 
sible that  there  may  have  been  some  modicum  of 
truth  in  it.  She  comforted  me  and  tied  a  rag  round 
my  finger. 

I  went  home  indignant,  my  bosom  bursting  with 
hatred  and  fury.  Between  Navarino  and  me  it 
was  war  from  that  day  forth;  war,  stern  and  piti- 
less. Whenever  we  met  I  proceeded  to  insult  and 
provoke  him,  and  he  would  fly  into  a  rage;  that, 
to  do  him  justice,  was  a  satisfaction  of  which  he 
never  deprived  me.  Sometimes  I  tickled  his  neck 


LITTLE  PIERRE  47 

with  a  straw,  sometimes  I  pelted  him  with  bread 
pills  and  he  would  open  his  beak  wide  and  in  hoarse 
tones  rasp  out  all  manner  of  unintelligible  threats. 
Madame  Laroque,  knitting  as  her  custom  was,  a 
width  of  a  flannel  petticoat,  used  to  look  at  me  over 
her  spectacles. 

"Pierre,"  she  would  say,  threatening  me  with  her 
wooden  needle,  "let  that  creature  alone.  You  know 
what  he  did  to  you  before.  Mark  my  words,  some- 
thing worse  will  happen  next  time,  if  you  don't  leave 
off." 

I  disregarded  this  sage  warning,  and  I  had  rea- 
son to  regret  it.  One  day,  when  I  was  playing  havoc 
with  his  feeding  tray,  throwing  about  his  maize  seed, 
the  old  warrior  leapt  upon  me,  and  plunging  his 
claws  into  my  hair,  mauled  and  tore  at  my  head 
with  his  talons.  If  the  infant  Ganymede  was  scared 
by  the  ravishing  eagle  that  gathered  him  lovingly  in 
his  soft  embrace,  judge  of  the  terror  I  felt  when 
Navarino  began  tearing  at  my  head  with  his  iron 
claws.  My  yells  were  heard  right  down  on  the  banks 
of  the  Seine.  Madame  Laroque,  laying  down  her 
everlasting  knitting,  detached  the  American  from 
his  prey  and  bore  him  back  on  her  shoulder  to  his 
perch.  Thence,  his  neck  ruffled  with  arrogance,  the 
spoils  of  my  hair  tangled  in  his  claws,  he  glared  at 
me  in  triumph  with  a  fiery  eye.  My  overthrow  was 
complete,  my  humiliation  profound. 

A  few  days  later,  I  made  my  way  into  our  kitchen, 


48  LITTLE  PIERRE 

where  countless  delights  exerted  an  unceasing  fas- 
cination over  me ;  and  there  I  saw  the  aged  Melanie 
chopping  up  parsley  on  a  board  with  a  knife.  I 
put  several  questions  to  her  regarding  this  herb, 
whose  pungent  odour  titillated  my  nostrils.  Mela- 
nie favoured  me  with  copious  information  concern- 
ing it.  She  imparted  to  me  that  parsley  was  used 
in  stews  and  as  a  seasoning  for  grilled  meats.  Finally 
she  told  me  that  it  was  a  deadly  poison  for  par- 
rots. On  hearing  this,  I  snatched  up  a  sprig  which 
had  escaped  the  knife  and  took  it  into  the  rose- 
papered  cabinet,  where  I  meditated  alone  and  in  si- 
lence. I  held  the  doom  of  Navarino  in  my  hands. 
After  deliberating  long  within  me,  I  quitted  the 
apartment  and  betook  myself  to  Madame  Laroque's; 
there  I  displayed  to  Navarino  the  death-dealing 
herb. 

"Look  here,"  I  said  to  him,  "this  is  parsley!  If 
I  were  to  mix  up  these  little  green,  curly  leaves 
with  your  hemp-seed  you  would  die  and  I  should 
have  my  revenge.  But  I  intend  to  reap  another 
sort  of  vengeance.  I  am  going  to  revenge  myself 
by  letting  you  live,"  and  with  these  words  I  flung 
the  fatal  herb  out  of  the  window. 

From  that  day  forth  I  ceased  to  worry  Nava- 
rino. I  made  up  my  mind  that  nothing  should  mar 
my  clemency.  We  became  friends. 


CHAPTER  VIII 

HOW   IT   EARLY   BECAME    EVIDENT  THAT   I    LACKED 
THE   BUSINESS  SENSE 

T  was  before  the  Revolution  of  '48 ; 
I  was  not  yet  four,  that  is  certain, 
but  was  I  three  and  a  half?  That 
is  what  I  cannot  be  quite  sure  of, 
and  now,  for  this  many  a  year  there 
has  been  no  one  left  on  earth  who 
could  throw  any  light  on  the  point.  One  must  make 
the  best  of  this  uncertainty,  and  console  oneself  with 
the  reflection  that  more  important  and  more  exasper- 
ating lacunae  present  themselves  in  the  history  of  na- 
tions. Chronology  and  geography,  it  has  been  said, 
are  the  two  eyes  of  history.  If  that  be  so,  everything 
leads  one  to  conclude  that,  despite  the  Benedictines 
of  Saint-Maur,  who  invented  the  art  of  verifying 
dates,  History  is,  to  say  the  least  of  it,  blind  of  one 
eye.  And,  let  me  add,  that  is  the  least  of  its  de- 
fects. Clio,  the  muse  Clio,  is  a  personage  of  grave 
and  occasionally  somewhat  austere  deportment,  and 
her  erudite  discourse,  as  we  are  told,  is  calculated 
to  interest,  to  inspire  and  to  amuse;  one  could  listen 
to  her  readily  a  whole  day  long.  Yet  have  I  noticed, 
from  long  and  assiduous  cultivation  of  her  company, 

M 


50  LITTLE  PIERRE 

that  she  but  too  often  allows  it  to  be  seen  that  she! 
is  forgetful,  vain,  biased,  ignorant  and  untruthful. 
Yet  with  all  her  faults  I  have  loved  her  much  and 
love  her  still.  These  are  the  only  bonds  that  unite 
me  to  Clio.  She  has  nothing  to  record  of  my 
childhood  nor,  for  that  matter,  of  the  rest  of  my 
life.  Happily,  I  am  by  no  means  an  historic  per- 
sonage and  proud  Clio  will  never  seek  to  discover 
whether  I  was  at  the  beginning,  the  middle  or  the 
end  of  my  third  year  when  I  betrayed  an  indication 
of  character  that  deeply  impressed  my  mother. 

I  was  then  a  very  ordinary  child,  with,  if  I  re- 
member rightly,  nothing  original  in  my  composi- 
tion, save  a  certain  reluctance  to  swallow  everything 
that  people  told  me.  This  characteristic,  the  mark 
of  an  inquiring  mind,  used  to  get  me  into  bad  odour, 
for  it  is  not  the  critical  sense  that  people  usually 
admire  in  a  child  of  three  or  three  and  a  half. 

I  might  dispense,  if  I  liked,  with  making  these  re- 
marks, for  they  have  just  as  little  to  do  with  the 
story  I  am  about  to  relate  as  chronology,  the  art  of 
verifying  dates  and  the  muse  Clio.  If  I  make  so 
many  digressions,  if  I  wander  away  along  so  many 
by-paths,  I  shall  never  reach  my  journey's  end.  But 
then  if  I  don't  amuse  myself  as  I  go  along,  if  I 
keep  strictly  to  the  road,  I  shall  get  there  all  at 
once;  I  shall  have  finished  in  the  twinkling  of  an 
eye.  And  that  would  be  a  pity,  at  least  for  me; 
for  I  love  to  linger  by  the  way.  I  know  nothing 


LITTLE  PIERRE  51 

more  pleasant  and  at  the  same  time  more  profitable. 
Of  all  the  schools  I  ever  went  to,  Dr.  Truant's 
was  the  one  in  which  I  got  on  best  and  learned  the 
most.  There  is  nothing  like  straying  from  the 
beaten  track,  my  friends.  If  Little  Red  Riding 
Hood  had  gone  through  the  wood  without  linger- 
ing to  gather  nuts,  the  wolf  wouldn't  have  eaten  her; 
and  every  moral  person  will  agree  that  the  best 
thing  that  could  happen  to  Little  Red  Riding  Hood 
and  her  like  is  to  be  eaten  up  by  the  wolf. 

This  reflection  brings  us  conveniently  back  to  the 
subject  of  my  narrative.  I  was  about  to  inform  you 
that  in  the  third  year  of  my  age  and  in  the  eighteenth 
and  last  of  the  reign  of  Louis  Philippe  the  First, 
King  of  France,  my  greatest  pleasure  in  life  was  go- 
ing for  walks.  They  did  not  send  me  into  the  wood, 
like  Little  Red  Riding  Hood;  alas,  I  was  not  so  Ar- 
cadian !  Born  and  brought  up  in  the  heart  of  Paris, 
on  the  brave  Quai  Malaquais,  I  knew  not  the  pleas- 
ures of  field  and  hedgerow.  But  assuredly  the  town 
also  has  its  charm.  Taking  my  hand  in  hers,  my 
mother  led  me  along  the  streets  with  their  countless 
sounds,  crowded  with  shifting  colours  and  enlivened 
by  the  throng  of  passers-by;  and  when  she  had  any 
purchases  to  make,  she  would  take  me  with  her  into 
the  shops.  We  were  not  rich,  and  she  did  not  spend 
much  money,  but  the  shops  she  used  to  visit  seemed 
to  me  to  be  unsurpassable  in  extent  and  splendour. 
The  Bon  Marche,  the  Louvre,  the  Printemps,  the 


52  LITTLE  PIERRE 

Galeries  did  not  exist  in  those  days.  The  largest  es- 
tablishments, in  the  latter  years  of  the  constitutional 
monarchy,  could  only  boast  a  local  clientele.  My 
mother,  who  belonged  to  the  Faubourg  Saint-Ger- 
main, used  to  go  to  the  Deux-Magots  and  the  Petit 
Saint-Thomas. 

Of  these  two  shops,  one  of  which  was  in  the  Rue 
de  Seine  and  the  other  in  the  Rue  du  Bac,  only  the 
latter  now  survives,  but  it  has  grown  so  big  and  so 
different,  with  the  lions'  heads  that  lend  terror  to  its 
front,  from  what  it  was  in  its  early  days,  that  I  no 
longer  recognize  it.  The  Deux-Magots  have  disap- 
peared and  perhaps  I  am  the  only  one  left  in  the 
world  who  can  recall  the  big  oil  painting  which  served 
as  a  shop  sign  and  which  represented  a  young  Chi- 
nese woman  between  two  of  her  fellow  country  men. 
I  was  already  keenly  alive  to  feminine  beauty,  and 
this  young  Chinese  woman,  with  her  hair  held  back 
with  a  large  comb  and  her  kiss-curls  about  her  tem- 
ples, quite  took  my  fancy.  But  of  her  two  admirers, 
of  their  bearing,  their  expression,  their  features, 
their  intentions,  of  these  I  could  say  nothing.  I  knew 
nothing  of  the  art  of  captivation. 

The  shop  seemed  to  me  immense  and  filled  with 
treasures.  It  was  there,  perhaps,  that  I  acquired  that 
predilection  for  sumptuous  things  which  became  very 
strong  in  me  and  has  never  left  me  since.  The  sight 
of  the  stuffs,  the  carpets,  the  embroideries,  the  feath- 
ers, the  flowers,  threw  me  into  a  kind  of  ecstasy  and, 


LITTLE  PIERRE  53 

with  my  whole  soul,  I  used  to  admire  those  affable 
gentlemen  and  gracious  young  ladies  who  smilingly 
offered  these  marvels  to  hesitating  customers.  When 
an  assistant  who  was  serving  my  mother  measured 
out  some  cloth  by  means  of  a  yard  wand  fixed  hori- 
zontally to  a  copper  rod  dependent  from  the  ceiling, 
it  seemed  to  me  that  his  calling  was  splendid  and  his 
destiny  glorious. 

I  also  admired  M.  Augris,  the  tailor  of  the  Rue 
du  Bac,  who  used  to  fit  me  with  jacket  and  knicker- 
bockers. I  would  have  preferred  him  to  make  me 
long  trousers  and  a  frock-coat  such  as  the  gentlemen 
wore;  and  this  desire  became  very  ardent  a  little 
later  on  when  I  read  a  story  by  Bouilly  concerning  an 
unfortunate  little  boy  who  was  taken  care  of  by  a 
worthy  and  kind-hearted  professor.  The  professor 
employed  him  as  his  secretary  and  dressed  him  in 
his  old  clothes.  The  worthy  Bouilly's  story  led  me 
to  do  a  very  silly  thing,  which  I  will  relate  another 
time.  Full  of  respect  for  the  arts  and  crafts,  I  ad- 
mired M.  Augris,  the  tailor  of  the  Rue  du  Bac,  who 
did  not  merit  admiration  because  he  cut  his  cloth  all 
awry.  Truth  to  tell,  in  the  clothes  he  made  for  me, 
I  looked  like  a  monkey. 

My  dear  mamma,  like  the  good  housekeeper  she 
was,  did  her  shopping  herself,  buying  her  groceries 
at  Courcelles'  in  the  Rue  Bonaparte,  her  coffee  at 
Corcelet's  in  the  Palais  Royal,  and  her  chocolate 
at  Debeauve  and  Gallais'  in  the  Rue  des  Saints- 


54  LITTLE  PIERRE 

Peres.  Whether  it  was  that  he  gave  one  plenty  of 
sugar-plums  to  taste,  or  that  he  made  the  crystals  of 
his  sugar-loaves  glisten  in  the  sun,  or  that,  with  a 
gesture  combining  boldness  and  elegance  he  turned 
a  pot  of  gooseberry  jelly  upside  down  to  show  how 
well  it  had  set,  M.  Courcelles  charmed  me  with  his 
persuasive  graces  and  his  convincing  demonstrations. 
I  used  to  get  almost  angry  with  my  mother  because 
of  the  doubtful  and  incredulous  air  with  which  she 
listened  to  the  assurance,  always  backed  with  ex- 
amples, offered  by  this  eloquent  grocer.  I  have  since 
learned  that  her  scepticism  was  justified. 

I  can  still  see  Corcelet's  shop,  at  the  sign  of  the 
"Gourmand";  a  little  low-ceiled  place  with  the 
name  painted  in  gilt  letters  on  a  red  ground.  It 
exhaled  a  delicious  smell  of  coffee,  and  there  was 
to  be  seen  there  a  painting,  an  old  one  even  in  those 
days,  representing  a  gourmand  dressed  in  the  same 
style  as  my  grandfather.  He  was  seated  at  a  table 
set  out  with  bottles  and  a  pasty  of  monstrous  size, 
and  adorned  with  a  pineapple  by  way  of  decoration. 
I  am  in  a  position  to  state,  thanks  to  information 
that  came  to  me  a  very  long  time  afterwards,  that 
it  was  a  portrait  of  Grimod  delaReyniere  byBouilly. 
It  was  with  feelings  of  respect  that  I  used  to  enter 
this  house,  which  seemed  to  belong  to  another  age 
and  to  take  one  back  to  the  Directoire.  Corcelet's 
man  weighed  and  served  in  silence.  The  simplicity 
of  his  demeanour,  which  contrasted  with  the  em- 


LITTLE  PIERRE  55 

phatic  mannerisms  of  M.  Courcelles,  made  an  im- 
pression on  me  and  it  may  be  that  my  first  lessons 
in  taste  and  moderation  were  derived  by  me  from 
an  old  grocer's  assistant. 

I  never  came  out  of  Corcelet's  shop  without  tak- 
ing a  coffee  bean  to  chew  on  the  way.  I  told  myself 
it  was  very  good  and  I  half  believed  it  was  so.  I 
felt  in  my  heart  that  it  was  execrable,  but  I  was  not 
yet  capable  of  bringing  to  light  the  truths  that  lay 
hidden  within  me.  Much  as  I  liked  Corcelet's  shop, 
at  the  sign  of  the  "Gourmand",  that  of  Debeauve 
and  Gallais,  purveyors  by  appointment  to  the  Kings 
of  France,  pleased  me  more  and  charmed  me  more 
than  any  other.  So  beautiful  did  it  seem  to  me,  that 
I  did  not  judge  myself  worthy  of  entering  therein 
save  in  my  Sunday  clothes,  and,  on  reaching  the 
threshold,  I  looked  carefully  at  my  mother's  attire 
in  order  to  satisfy  myself  that  it  was  suitably  ele- 
gant. Well,  well,  my  taste-  was  not  so  bad  I  The 
house  of  Debeauve  and  Gallais,  chocolate  makers  to 
the  Kings  of  France,  is  still  in  existence  and  its 
appearance  has  changed  but  little.  I  can  therefore 
speak  of  it  from  actual  knowledge  and  not  from 
fallacious  recollection.  It  creates  a  very  good  im- 
pression. Its  scheme  of  decoration  dates  from  the 
early  years  of  the  Restoration,  before  style  in  such 
matters  had  become  too  heavy,  and  it  is  in  the  man- 
ner of  Percier  and  Fontaine.  I  cannot  help  sadly 
reflecting  when  I  look  at  these  motifs,  rather  frigid, 


56  LITTLE  PIERRE 

it  may  be,  but  delicate,  pure  and  well  ordered,  how 
taste  in  France  has  deteriorated  during  the  last  cen- 
tury. What  a  distance  we  have  travelled  from  the 
decorative  art  of  the  Empire,  inferior  as  that  was 
to  the  style  of  Louis  XVI  and  the  Directoire.  In 
this  old-world  shop  one  cannot  but  admire  the  sign 
with  its  well  proportioned,  bold  lettering;  the  arched 
windows  with  their  fan-shaped  mouldings,  the  far 
end  of  the  shop  rounded  like  a  little  temple,  the 
counter  semi-circular  in  shape  following  the  curve 
of  the  room.  I  don't  know  whether  I  am  dreaming, 
but  it  seems  to  me  that  I  have  seen  pier-glasses  there 
adorned  with  allegorical  figures  of  Fame  which 
might  do  honour  to  Arcole  and  Lodi  quite  as  ap- 
propriately as  to  chocolate  creams  and  chocolate  al- 
monds. In  fine,  the  whole  thing  was  consistent. 
It  possessed  a  character  and  conveyed  a  meaning. 
What  do  they  do  nowadays?  There  are  still  ar- 
tists of  genius,  but  the  decorative  arts  have  fallen 
into  a  most  ignominious  decline.  The  style  of  the  * 
Third  Republic  makes  one  sigh  for  Napoleon  III; 
Napoleon  III  for  Louis  Philippe ;  Louis  Philippe  for 
Charles  X;  Charles  X  for  the  Directoire;  the  Di- 
rectoire for  Louis  XVI.  The  sense  of  line  and  pro- 
portion is  completely  lost.  Therefore  I  hail  with 
delight  the  advent  of  the  New  Art,  not  so  much, 
indeed,  for  what  it  brings  as  for  what  it  takes  away. 
Need  I  remark  that  when  I  was  but  three  or 
four  years  old  I  was  not  given  to  discussing  the  the- 


LITTLE  PIERRE  57 

ory  of  decoration?  But,  whenever  I  went  into  the 
establishment  of  Messrs.  Debeauve  and  Gallais,  it 
seemed  to  me  as  though  I  were  entering  a  fairy 
palace.  What  assisted  the  illusion  was  the  sight 
of  certain  young  ladies  there  in  black  gowns,  with 
lustrous  hair,  seated  round  the  semi-circular  coun- 
ter in  attitudes  of  gracious  solemnity.  In  the  midst 
of  them,  gentle  and  grave  of  mien,  sat  a  lady  of 
riper  years,  who  made  entries  in  registers  which 
reposed  on  a  big  desk,  and  handled  pieces  of  money 
and  bank-notes.  It  will  soon  be  shown  that  I  quite 
failed  to  acquire  any  adequate  understanding  of  the 
operations  performed  by  this  venerable  dame.  On 
either  side  of  her,  young  ladies,  both  dark  and  fair, 
were  busily  engaged,  some  in  covering  the  cakes  of 
chocolate  with  a  thin  metal  leaf  of  silvery  bright- 
ness, others  in  enveloping  these  same  cakes,  two  at 
a  time,  in  white  paper  wrappers  with  pictures  on 
them  and  then  sealing  these  wrappers  with  wax 
which  they  heated  in  the  flame  of  a  little  tin  lamp. 
They  accomplished  these  tasks  with  skill  and  with 
a  celerity  that  seemed  to  betoken  delight.  I  im- 
agine, when  I  come  to  think  of  it  now,  that  they 
did  not  work  like  that  for  the  fun  of  the  thing;  but 
in  those  days  I  might  quite  well  have  made  a  mis- 
take, seeing  how  ready  I  was  to  look  on  any  kind 
of  work  as  a  diversion.  This  at  least  is  certain, 
that  it  was  a  joy  to  the  eye  to  watch  the  deft  fingers 
of  those  young  women. 


58  LITTLE  PIERRE 

When  my  mother  had  completed  her  purchases, 
the  matron  who  presided  over  this  assembly  of  wise 
virgins  extracted  from  a  crystal  bowl  that  stood  be- 
side her  a  chocolate  drop,  which  she  offered  me  with 
a  watery  smile.  And  this  solemn  gift,  more  than 
anything  else,  made  me  love  and  admire  the  estab- 
lishment of  Messrs.  Debeauve  and  Gallais,  purvey- 
ors to  the  Kings  of  France. 

Being  fond  of  all  that  had  to  do  with  shops,  it 
was  quite  natural  that,  when  I  got  home,  I  should 
try  to  imitate  in  my  games  the  scenes  I  had  wit- 
nessed while  my  mother  was  making  her  purchases. 
Thus  it  came  about  that,  in  my  father's  house,  I 
became  all  to  myself,  and  without  anybody  being 
aware  of  it,  successively  a  tailor,  a  grocer,  a  fancy- 
goods  man  and,  no  less  readily,  a  dressmaker  and  a 
chocolate  saleswoman.  Now  it  befell  that  one  eve- 
ning, in  the  little  room  with  the  rosebud  wall-paper, 
where  my  mother  was  sitting  with  her  needlework  in 
her  hand,  I  was  applying  myself  with  more  assiduity 
than  usual  to  the  task  of  imitating  the  fair  ladies  of 
Messrs.  Debeauve  and  Gallais'  establishment.  Hav- 
ing collected  as  many  pieces  of  chocolate  as  I  could 
lay  hands  on,  together  with  some  bits  of  paper  and 
even  some  fragmentary  pieces  of  those  metallic 
leaves  which  I  termed  emphatically  silver  paper,  all 
if  the  truth  be  told  considerably  the  worse  for  wear, 
I  seated  myself  in  my  little  chair,  a  present  from 
my  Aunt  Chausson,  with  a  moleskin  stool  in  front 


LITTLE  PIERRE  59 

of  me.  All  of  this  paraphernalia  represented  in  my 
eyes  the  elegant  semi-circle  of  the  store  in  the  Rue 
des  Saints-Peres.  Being  an  only  child,  accustomed  to 
amuse  myself  and  always  deep  in  some  day-dream, 
passing,  that  is  to  say,  a  great  part  of  my  time  in 
the  world  of  shadows,  it  was  easy  enough  for  me 
to  summon  up  to  my  imagination  the  absent  shop 
with  its  panelling,  its  glass  cabinets,  its  pier-glasses 
adorned  with  the  allegorical  figure  of  Fame  and 
even  the  purchasers  flocking  thither  in  crowds — 
women,  children  and  old  men — so  great  was  my 
power  to  evoke  at  will  both  scenes  and  actors.  I  had 
no  difficulty  in  enacting,  in  my  sole  person,  the  young 
lady  customers,  the  young  demoiselles  of  the  counter 
and  the  highly  respectable  dame  who  kept  the  books 
and  looked  after  the  cash.  My  magic  power  knew 
no  limits  and  exceeded  all  that  I  have  since  read 
of  in  The  Golden  Ass  concerning  the  witches  of 
Thessaly.  I  could  change  my  nature  at  will.  I  was 
capable  of  assuming  the  strangest  and  most  ex- 
traordinary shapes,  of  becoming,  by  magic,  a  King, 
a  dragon,  a  demon,  a  fairy,  nay,  of  changing  into 
an  army,  or  a  river,  a  forest  or  a  mountain.  What 
I  was  attempting  that  evening  was  therefore  a  mere 
trifle  and  offered  no  difficulty  whatever.  And  so  I 
wrapped  up  and  I  sealed  and  I  served  customers 
without  number — women,  children  and  old  men. 
Filled  with  the  idea  of  my  own  importance  (must  I 
avow  it?) ,  I  spoke  very  curtly  to  my  imaginary  com- 


60  LITTLE  PIERRE 

panions,  chiding  their  slowness  and  taking  them  un- 
mercifully to  task  for  their  mistakes.  But,  when  it 
came  to  playing  the  part  of  the  aged  and  respectable 
dame  who  had  charge  of  the  cash,  I  became  suddenly 
embarrassed.  In  this  crisis  I  left  the  shop  and  went 
to  ask  my  dear  mamma  to  clear  up  a  point  con- 
cerning which  I  was  still  in  the  dark.  I  had  seen  the 
old  dame  open  her  drawer  and  stir  the  money  about, 
but  I  had  never  arrived  at  a  sufficiently  exact  notion 
of  the  nature  of  the  operations  performed  by  her. 
Kneeling  down  at  my  mother's  feet — she  was  em- 
broidering a  handkerchief  in  her  deep  easy  chair — 
I  asked: 

"Mamma,  in  the  shops,  is  it  the  people  who  sell 
or  the  people  who  buy  that  pay  the  money?" 

My  mother  looked  at  me  in  wide-eyed  surprise, 
raised  her  eyebrows  and  smiled  at  me  without  re- 
plying. Then  she  grew  thoughtful.  At  that  mo- 
ment my  father  came  into  the  room. 

"What  do  you  think  Pierrot  has  just  been  ask- 
ing me?"  she  said.  "You  will  never  guess.  He 
wants  to  know  whether  it  is  the  people  who  buy 
or  the  people  who  sell  that  pay  the  money." 

"Oh,  the  little  duffer!"  said  my  father. 

"It's  not  just  ordinary  childish  ignorance,  that," 
said  my  mother,  "it's  a  sign  of  character.  Pierre 
will  never  learn  the  value  of  money." 

My  dear  mother  had  read  my  character  and  my 
future:  she  was  prophesying.  No,  it  was  never  to 


LITTLE  PIERRE  61 

be  my  fate  to  know  the  value  of  money.  What  I 
was  as  a  little  boy  of  three  or  three  and  a  half,  in 
the  little  sitting-room  papered  with  rosebuds,  that 
I  have  remained  till  my  old  age,  which  rests  lightly 
upon  me,  as  it  does  on  all  who  are  free  from  avarice 
and  pride.  No,  mother  dear,  I  have  never  known 
the  value  of  money.  Even  now  I  know  it  not, 
or  perhaps  I  had  better  say  that  I  know  it  too  well. 
I  know  that  money  is  the  cause  of  all  those  ills 
that  afflict  our  social  order,  which  is  so  cruel  and 
whereof  we  are  so  proud.  That  little  boy  whose 
memory  I  have  just  evoked,  that  little  boy  who, 
when  playing  his  games,  did  not  know  whether  it  was 
the  buyer  or  the  seller  who  had  to  pay,  sets  me 
thinking  all  at  once  of  that  maker  of  pipes  whom 
William  Morris  presents  to  us  in  that  fine  Utopian 
story  of  his,  that  simple-hearted  craftsman  who,  in 
the  city  of  the  future,  made  pipes  which  surpassed 
all  others  in  beauty  because  he  brought  love  to  the 
carving  of  them  and  bestowed  them  as  gifts,  taking 
no  money  in  exchange. 


CHAPTER  IX 

THE  DRUM 

O  live  is  to  desire.  And,  according 
as  a  man  deems  that  desire  is  sweet 
or  bitter,  so  will  he  regard  life  as 
good  or  bad.  Each  one  of  us  has 
to  decide  the  question  for  himself. 
Argument  is  useless:  it  is  a  matter 
of  metaphysics.  When  I  was  five,  I  desired  a  drum. 
Was  that  desire  sweet  or  bitter?  I  know  not.  Let 
us  say  that  it  was  bitter  in  so  far  as  it  resulted  from 
the  lack  of  something,  and  that  it  was  sweet  inas- 
much as  it  conjured  up  to  my  imagination  the  ob- 
ject desired. 

In  order  that  there  may  be  no  misunderstanding 
in  the  matter,  let  me  add  that  I  wanted  to  have  a 
drum  without  being  conscious  of  any  desire  to  be- 
come a  drummer.  Of  that  calling  I  contemplated 
neither  the  glory  nor  the  risks.  Although  fairly  fa- 
miliar, for  my  age,  with  the  military  annals  of 
France,  I  had  not  as  yet  heard  the  story  of  Bara, 
the  Drummer,  who  died  clasping  his  drumsticks  to 
his  heart,  or  of  that  heroic  boy  of  fifteen  who,  at 
the  Battle  of  Zurich,  with  his  arm  pierced  by  a  bullet, 

continued  to  sound  the  charge,  was  rewarded  by  the 

62 


LITTLE  PIERRE  63 

First  Consul  with  a  pair  of  presentation  drumsticks 
and,  to  prove  himself  worthy  of  them,  got  killed  at 
the  first  opportunity.  Brought  up  during  a  period  of 
peace,  I  knew  nothing  of  drummers  save  the  two 
drummers  of  the  Garde  Nationale  who,  on  New 
Year's  Day,  used  to  present  my  father,  a  Major  in 
the  2nd  Battalion,  and  his  lady,  with  an  address 
ornamented  with  a  coloured  picture.  The  picture 
represented  the  two  drum  majors,  very  much  ideal- 
ized, in  a  magnificently  gilded  salon,  bowing  to  a 
gentleman  in  a  green  frock-coat  and  a  lady  wearing  a 
crinoline  and  lace  flounces.  In  reality  they  had  rov- 
ing eyes,  heavy  moustaches  and  rubicund  noses.  My 
father  would  give  them  a  crown  piece  and  send  them 
off  to  drink  a  glass  of  wine  which  old  Melanie  poured 
out  for  them  in  the  kitchen.  They  would  drink  it 
down  at  one  long  draught,  smack  their  lips  and  wipe 
their  mouths  on  the  sleeve  of  their  tunics.  Although 
there  was  a  joviality  about  them  that  rather  took  my 
fancy,  they  never  inspired  me  with  any  desire  to  be- 
come as  one  of  them.  No,  I  had  no  desire  to  be  a 
drummer.  I  would  rather  have  been  a  general,  and, 
if  I  burned  to  possess  a  drum  and  a  pair  of  black 
drumsticks,  the  reason  was  that  I  used  to  associate 
these  objects  with  countless  scenes  of  war. 

No  one  could  have  reproached  me  at  that  time 
with  preferring  Cassandra's  couch  to  Achilles'  spear. 
Arms  and  combats  were  the  breath  of  life  to  me.  I 
revelled  in  slaughter.  I  had  become  a  hero,  if  the 


64  LITTLE  PIERRE 

fates  that  hamper  our  projects  had  permitted.  But 
they  did  not. 

The  very  next  year  they  turned  me  aside  from  so 
glorious  a  path  and  inspired  me  with  a  love  for 
dolls.  Despite  the  way  people  tried  to  shame  me,  I 
bought  several  out  of  my  savings.  I  loved  them  all; 
but  I  adored  one  above  all  the  rest  and  my  mother 
said  it  was  not  the  prettiest.  But  why  should  I 
be  in  such  a  hurry  to  dim  the  glory  of  my  fourth 
year,  when  all  my  desires  were  centred  on  a  drum? 

Not  being  endowed  with  a  stoic's  restraint,  I  often 
avowed  my  longing  to  persons  able  to  satisfy  it. 
They  pretended  not  to  hear,  or  else  answered  in 
a  way  that  drove  me  to  desperation. 

"You  know  perfectly  well,"  my  mother  used  to 
say,  "that  your  father  dislikes  toys  that  make  a 


noise." 


As  she  refused  me  out  of  a  sense  of  wifely  duty, 
I  transferred  my  request  to  my  Aunt  Chausson,  who 
felt  no  compunction  in  making  herself  disagreeable 
to  my  father.  I  had  perceived  that  very  clearly, 
and  it  was  a  circumstance  on  which  I  relied  to  ob- 
tain possession  of  the  object  I  so  ardently  coveted. 
Unfortunately,  Aunt  Chausson  was  parsimonious. 
She  rarely  gave  anything  away,  and  not  much,  at 
that. 

"What  do  you  want  with  a  drum?"  she  said. 
"Haven't  you  got  toys  enough?  You've  cupboards 
full  of  them.  In  my  day  children  were  not  spoiled 


LITTLE  PIERRE  65 

as  they  are  now.  My  little  playmates  and  I  used 
to  make  dolls  out  of  bits  of  paper.  Haven't  you 
got  a  lovely  Noah's  Ark?" 

She  was  referring  to  a  Noah's  Ark  which  she 
had  given  me  on  New  Year's  Day,  twelve  months 
before  and  which,  I  confess,  had  appeared  to  me  at 
first  as  something  supernatural.  It  contained  the 
patriarch  and  his  family,  and  couples  of  all  the  living 
things  in  creation.  But  the  butterflies  were  bigger 
than  the  elephants,  and  that,  after  a  time,  outraged 
my  sense  of  proportion.  And  now  that  the  quadru- 
peds, owing  to  my  rough  usage,  had  only  got  three 
legs  to  stand  on,  and  that  Noah  had  lost  his  staff, 
the  Ark  had  no  longer  any  charm  for  me. 

One  day,  when  I  had  a  cold  and  was  obliged  to 
stay  in  my  room  with  my  nightcap  tied  under  my 
chin,  I  made  myself  a  drum  out  of  a  butter  tub  and 
a  wooden  spoon.  It  must  have  been  a  thing  rather 
in  the  Dutch  manner,  after  the  style  of  Brauwer 
or  Jan  Steen.  My  tastes  were  more  exalted,  and, 
when  my  old  Melanie  entered  in  a  fume  to  recover 
possession  of  her  butter  tub  and  cooking  spoon,  I 
was  already  sick  of  them. 

It  was  about  that  time  that  my  father,  one  eve- 
ning, brought  me  home  a  fancy  biscuit  representing  a 
Pierrot  beating  a  big  drum.  I  don't  know  whether 
he  thought  that  the  image  would  prove  a  satisfactory 
substitute  for  the  reality,  or  whether  he  wanted  to 
make  fun  of  me.  He  smiled,  as  was  his  wont,  a 


66  LITTLE  PIERRE 

little  sadly.  Whatever  the  reason,  I  received  his 
present  with  an  ill  grace  and  the  biscuit,  harsh  and 
rasping  to  the  touch,  filled  me  with  a  sudden  aver- 
sion. 

I  had  quite  given  up  hope  of  ever  attaining  the 
object  of  my  desires  when,  one  bright  summer's  day, 
after  lunch,  my  mother  embraced  me  tenderly,  told 
me  to  be  a  good  boy  and  sent  me  out  with  Melanie 
for  a  walk,  having  put  into  my  hands  an  article 
shaped  like  a  cylinder  and  wrapped  in  a  piece  of 
brown  paper. 

I  opened  the  parcel,  and,  behold,  it  was  a  drum  I 
By  this  time  my  mother  had  gone  out  of  the  room. 
I  hung  the  beloved  instrument  on  my  shoulder  by 
the  cord  which  did  duty  for  a  bandoleer  and  raised 
no  question  as  to  what  the  fates  would  demand  of 
me  in  return.  In  those  days  I  thought  that  the  gifts 
of  fortune  were  gratis.  I  had  not  learned  from 
Herodotus  to  identify  the  heavenly  Nemesis,  and  I 
knew  not  the  poet's  adage,  whereon  in  after  years 
I  have  pondered  long: 

"C'est  un  ordre  des  Dieux  qui  jamais  ne  se  rompt 
De  nous  vendre  bien  cher  les  grands  biens  qu'ils  nous  font." 

Happy  and  proud,  the  drum  at  my  side,  the  drum- 
sticks in  my  hands,  I  darted  forth  and  marched  in 
front  of  Melanie,  beating  my  drum  with  a  gallant 
flourish.  I  marched  as  though  to  the  attack,  as  one 
leading  his  armies  to  certain  victory.  I  had  a  sort 
of  feeling,  though  I  did  not  avow  it  even  to  myself, 


LITTLE  PIERRE  67 

that  my  drum  was  not  very  sonorous  and  was  not 
to  be  heard  three  miles  away.  And  it  was  the  fact 
that  the  ass's  skin  (if  skin  it  were,  which  I  greatly 
doubt  to-day),  being  loosely  stretched,  did  not  re- 
sound beneath  the  blow  of  the  drumsticks,  which 
were  so  slender  and  so  light  that  I  could  not  feel 
them  between  my  fingers.  I  recognized  the  peace- 
loving  and  watchful  spirit  of  my  mother  and  her 
zeal  in  banishing  noisy  playthings  from  the  house. 
She  had  already  removed  all  the  guns,  pistols  and 
rifles,  to  my  great  regret,  because  I  delighted  in  up- 
roar and  my  soul  was  uplifted  at  the  sound  of  de- 
tonations. Doubtless  no  one  would  want  to  have 
a  silent  drum.  But  enthusiasm  makes  up  for  every 
defect.  The  tumult  of  my  heart  filled  my  ears  with 
the  sound  of  glory.  I  seemed  to  hear  a  cadence  that 
made  ten  thousand  men  march  onward  keeping  step 
as  one ;  I  seemed  to  hear  the  rolling  sounds  that  fill 
men's  heart  with  heroism  and  awe;  I  seemed  to  be- 
hold, in  the  flowering  gardens  of  the  Luxembourg 
columns  advancing  as  far  as  the  eye  could  see  across 
illimitable  plains ;  I  conjured  up  the  vision  of  horses, 
cannons,  gun-carriages  making  deep  ruts  in  the 
roads,  gleaming  helmets  with  sable  streamers,  fuf 
caps,  aigrettes,  plumes,  lances  and  bayonets. 

I  saw,  I  felt,  I  created  it  all,  and,  in  the  world  of 
my  imagination,  I  myself  was  all,  the  men,  the 
horses,  the  guns,  the  powder  magazines,  the  fiery 
heavens  and  the  blood-stained  earth.  That  was 


68  LITTLE  PIERRE 

what  I  conjured  forth  from  my  drum.  And  my 
Aunt  Chausson  had  asked  me  what  I  wanted  with  a 
drum! 

When  I  returned  to  the  house  it  was  silent.  I 
called  out  for  my  mother,  but  she  did  not  answer. 
I  ran  to  her  bedroom  and  to  the  rosebud  sitting- 
room,  but  there  was  no  one  there.  I  went  into  my 
father's  study;  it  was  empty.  Standing  erect  on 
the  drawing-room  clock  Foyatier's  Spartacus  alone 
responded  to  my  anxious  look,  with  his  gesture  of 
eternal  indignation. 

"Mamma!"  I  cried,  "Mamma,  where  are  you?" 

And  I  began  to  weep. 

Then  old  Melanie  told  me  that  my  father  and 
mother  had  departed  on  the  diligence  that  leaves 
the  Rue  du  Bouloi  for  Le  Havre,  with  Monsieur 
and  Madame  Danguin,  and  that  they  would  be  away 
a  week. 

This  announcement  plunged  me  into  the  depths 
of  despair,  and  I  knew  at  what  a  price  Fate  had 
granted  me  a  drum;  I  knew  that  my  mother  had 
given  me  a  toy  to  cover  her  departure  and  to  dis- 
tract my  thoughts  from  her  absence.  And  remem- 
bering the  grave  and  somewhat  melancholy  voice 
in  which,  as  she  kissed  me,  she  bade  me  "Be  a  good 
boy!"  I  wondered  how  it  was  I  had  nfcver  sus- 
pected it. 

"If  I  had  only  known,"  I  thought,  "I  wouldn't 
have  let  her  go." 


LITTLE  PIERRE  69 

I  was  sad  and  also  ashamed  at  having  allowed 
myself  to  be  taken  in.  And  there  had  been  so  many 
signs  that  ought  to  have  told  me  what  was  afoot 
For  days  past  I  had  heard  my  parents  whispering 
together,  I  had  heard  cupboard  doors  creaking,  I 
had  seen  piles  of  linen  on  the  beds,  trunks  and  port- 
manteaux encumbering  the  rooms — the  domed  lid 
of  one  of  the  trunks  was  covered  with  a  skin  worn 
bare  in  patches,  over  which  were  fixed  bands  of 
very  dirty  black  wood;  it  was  a  hideous  thing.  All 
these  presages  appeared  to  me  in  vain,  though  a 
wretched  dog  would  have  been  disturbed  by  them. 
I  had  heard  my  father  say  that  Finette  used  to  know 
when  anyone  was  about  to  go  away. 

The  house  seemed  vast  and  cheerless.  The  hor- 
rible silence  which  reigned  within  it  sent  a  chill  to  my 
heart.  To  fill  the  void  Melanie  was  really  too  little. 
Her  fluted  cap  scarcely  reached  above  my  head.  I 
loved  Melanie,  I  loved  her  with  all  the  force  of  my 
childish  egoism,  but  she  was  not  sufficient  to  occupy 
my  mind.  Her  remarks  struck  me  as  insipid.  For 
all  that  her  hair  was  grey  and  her  back  growing 
round,  she  appeared  to  me  to  be  more  of  a  child  than 
I  was.  The  thought  of  living  a  whole  week  alone 
with  her  reduced  me  to  despair. 

She  tried  to  console  me.  She  said  that  a  week 
was  soon  over;  that  my  mother  would  bring  back 
a  nice  little  boat,  that  I  could  sail  it  on  the  Luxem- 
bourg lake,  that  my  father  and  mother  would  tell 


70  LITTLE  PIERRE 

me  about  all  the  things  that  happened  to  them  on 
their  journey  and  would  give  me  such  a  good  de- 
scription of  the  fine  port  at  Le  Havre  that  I  should 
fancy  I  was  there  myself.  It  must  be  admitted  that 
this  last  touch  was  not  without  merit  since  the  pigeon 
of  the  fabulist  employed  it  to  console  his  tender  con- 
sort for  his  absence.  But  I  refused  to  be  comforted. 
I  did  not  think  consolation  was  possible  and  I  deemed 
that  it  would  detract  from  the  nobility  of  my  atti- 
tude. 

Aunt  Chausson  came  to  dine  with  me.  It  gave 
me  no  pleasure  to  behold  her  owlish  countenance. 
She  also  proffered  consolation,  but  her  comfort  had 
a  flavour  of  old  bones  about  it,  like  everything  else 
she  gave  away.  Hers  was  too  niggardly  a  nature 
to  bestow  consolation  in  fresh  and  pure  abundance. 
At  the  dinner  table  she  sat  in  my  mother's  place, 
from  which,  therefore,  no  imperceptible  effluence  of 
her  could  arise,  no  impalpable  shade,  no  invisible 
image,  nothing  of  that  mysterious  essence  of  absent 
beloved  ones  which  lingers  about  the  things  with 
which  they  were  familiar.  The  incongruity  of  the 
thing  exasperated  me.  In  my  despair  I  refused  to 
eat  my  soup  and  took  pride  in  the  refusal.  I  don't 
remember  whether  it  occurred  to  me  then  that,  in 
similar  circumstances,  Finette  would  have  done  as 
much;  but,  if  it  had,  I  should  not  have  felt  ashamed, 
for  I  realized  that,  in  matters  of  instinct  and  feel- 
ing, animals  were  far  beyond  me.  My  mother  had 


LITTLE  PIERRE  71 

left  orders  that  there  should  be  a  vol-au-vent  and 
some  cream  for  dinner,  thinking  that  these  things 
were  calculated  to  take  my  mind  off  my  troubles.  I 
had  refused  the  soup ;  I  accepted  the  vol-au-vent  and 
the  cream  and,  in  them,  found  some  relief  for  my 
woes. 

After  dinner  Aunt  Chausson  advised  me  to  go 
and  play  with  my  Noah's  Ark;  this  suggestion  made 
me  blaze  with  fury.  I  answered  her  in  a  most  im- 
pertinent manner  and,  not  only  that,  but  hurled  some 
very  unseemly  insults  at  Melanie,  who,  in  the  whole 
course  of  her  saintly  life,  never  merited  aught  but 
praise. 

Poor  soul,  she  put  me  to  bed  with  delicate  care, 
wiped  away  my  tears  and  fixed  up  her  own  truckle- 
bed  in  my  room.  Nevertheless,  I  was  swiftly  to  per- 
ceive the  terrible  effects  of  the  lonely  state  to  which 
my  mother  had  abandoned  me.  But,  properly  to  un- 
derstand what  befell  me,  it  must  be  borne  in  mind 
that,  every  night,  in  that  very  room,  before  I  fell 
asleep,  I  used  to  see  from  my  bed  a  troop  of  little 
men  with  big  heads,  hump-backed,  bandy-legged, 
curiously  deformed,  wearing  felt  hats  with  feathers 
stuck  in  them,  great  round  spectacles  on  their  noses, 
and  carrying  divers  objects  such  as  spigots,  mando- 
lins, saucepans,  tambourines,  saws,  trumpets, 
crutches,  wherewith  they  made  strange  noises,  tread- 
ing fantastic  measures.  Their  appearance  there  at 
this  hour  had  ceased  to  astonish  me.  I  was  not  suf- 


72  LITTLE  PIERRE 

ficiently  well  acquainted  with  the  laws  of  Nature  to 
know  that  such  a  phenomenon  was  inconsistent  with 
them;  and  since  the  same  procession  took  place 
regularly,  night  after  night,  I  did  not  regard 
it  as  extraordinary.  It  scared  me,  without,  how- 
ever, causing  me  sufficient  fear  to  make  me 
scream.  A  circumstance  that  greatly  allayed  my 
terror  was  that  I  noticed  that  these  little  min- 
strels kept  very  close  to  the  wall  and  never  came 
near  my  bed.  Such  was  their  custom.  They  looked 
as  if  they  did  not  see  me  and  I  held  my  breath  so  as 
not  to  attract  their  attention.  It  was  assuredly  my 
mother's  good  influence  that  kept  them  away  from 
me,  but  doubtless  the  aged  Melanie  did  not  exert  the 
same  sway  over  these  mischievous  spirits,  for  on 
that  dreadful  night  when  the  diligence  of  the  Rue 
du  Bouloi  carried  off  my  beloved  parents  to  distant 
shores,  these  little  musicians  noticed  my  presence  for 
the  first  time.  One  of  them,  a  little  personage  with 
a  wooden  leg  and  a  plaster  over  his  eye,  nudged  his 
neighbour  and  pointed  his  finger  at  me  and  then  all 
of  them,  one  after  another,  turned  to  look  at  me, 
put  on  enormous  round  spectacles  and  examined  me 
curiously,  with  no  friendly  expression.  I  began  to 
tremble  in  every  limb.  But  when  they  came  over 
to  my  bed,  dancing  and  brandishing  spigots,  saws 
and  stewpans,  and  one  of  them,  with  a  nose  like  a 
clarinet,  pointed  at  me  with  a  syringe  as  big  round 


LITTLE  PIERRE  73 

as  the  telescope  at  the  Observatory,  I  was  frozen 
with  terror  and  called  out: 

"Mamma!  Mamma!" 

Hearing  my  cry,  old  Melanie  came  running  to 
see  what  was  the  matter.  At  the  sight  of  her  I 
burst  into  tears.  Then  I  dropped  off  to  sleep  again. 

When  I  awoke  to  the  twittering  of  the  sparrows,  I 
had  forgotten  all,  the  melancholy  absence  of  my 
parents  and  my  own  loneliness.  Alas,  my  mother's 
radiant  face  did  not  lean  down  over  my  bed,  her 
dark  wavy  tresses  did  not  caress  my  cheeks,  I  did 
not  breathe-in  the  iris  which  perfumed  her  dressing- 
gown.  Instead,  I  beheld  the  cheeks  of  my  old  Mela- 
nie, that  resembled  winter  apples.  She  appeared  to 
me  in  an  enormous  night  cap  and  I  saw  temples  and 
Cupids  on  the  dear  creature's  night-gown.  They 
were  printed  in  pink  on  a  hodden-grey  ground  and 
she  wore  them  in  perfect  innocence.  The  sight  re- 
newed my  grief.  All  the  morning  I  wandered,  dis- 
consolate, about  the  silent  dwelling.  Finding  my 
drum  on  a  chair  in  the  dining-room,  I  threw  it  on 
the  floor  in  a  passion,  and,  with  a  blow  of  my  heel, 
stove  it  in. 

Later  on,  when  I  had  arrived  at  Man's  estate,  it 
may  have  chanced  that  I  again  felt  a  desire  for  some- 
thing similar  to  that  sonorous  and  hollow  instru- 
ment for  which  I  had  longed  so  greatly  when  a  little 
child — for  the  tympana  of  glory  or  the  cymbals  of 
popular  favour.  But,  as  soon  as  I  felt  this  desire 


74  LITTLE  PIERRE 

coming  to  life  and  stirring  within  me,  I  bethought 
me  of  the  drum  of  my  childhood  when  I  was  a  little 
boy  of  four,  and  of  the  price  I  had  paid  for  it,  and 
forthwith  I  ceased  to  desire  the  favours  that  des- 
tiny does  not  bestow  on  us  without  asking  something 
in  return. 

Jean  Racine,  reading  in  his  Latin  Bible,  under- 
lined the  following  passage :  Et  tribuit  eis  petitionem 
eorum,  and  he  recalled  it  when  he  put  into  the  mouth 
of  Aricie  those  words  which  bring  a  pallor  to  the 
cheek  of  the  imprudent  Theseus : 

"Craignez,  seigneur,  craignez  que  le  ciel  rigoureux 
Ne  vous  hai'sse  assez  pour  exaucer  vos  voeux. 
Souvent  dans  sa  colere  il  re^oit  nos  victimes: 
Ses  presents  sont  souvent  la  peine  de  nos  crimes." 


CHAPTER  X 

COMEDY  WELL  HANDLED 

N  those  days,  when  I  lay  sleepless  in 
bed  because  I  was  out  of  sorts,  or 
simply  because  I  had  awakened 
earlier  than  usual,  I  used  to  be 
conscious  that  an  ashen  and  dismal 
countenance  was  gazing  at  me,  a 
countenance  vast  and  indeterminate  of  outline,  a 
phantom,  in  short,  morei  dreadful  than  pain  or 
fear.  It  was  the  thing  we  call  Ennui.  Not 
the  sort  of  heart-ache  whereof  the  poets  sing, 
•a  heart-ache  tinged  with  the  hues  of  hatred  or 
of  love,  a  heart-ache  high-sorrowful  and  splendid; 
no,  not  that,  but  the  dull,  monotonous,  fathomless 
ennui,  the  fog  within,  emptiness  grown  visible.  To 
banish  this  spectral  intruder  I  would  call  for  my 
mother  and  for  Melanie.  Alas,  they  came  not,  or  if 
they  came,  they  stayed  but  a  moment  at  my  side,  and 
said  to  me,  as  the  bee  remarked  to  Madame  Des- 
bordes-Valmore's  little  boy: 

"Je  suis  tris  pressie, 
On  nc  rit  pas  toujours." 

And  my  mother  would  add  the  recommendation  that 
I  should  just  run  through  my  multiplication  table  to 
pass  away  the  time. 

75 


76  LITTLE  PIERRE 

That  was  an  extreme  measure  that  I  was  loath  to 
adopt.  My  tastes  lay  rather  in  the  direction  of 
pretending  I  was  making  a  voyage  round  the  world 
and  taking  part  in  extraordinary  adventures.  I  used 
to  get  shipwrecked  and  to  swim  ashore  to  an  island 
inhabited  by  lions  and  tigers.  With  a  powerful 
imagination  to  back  me,  that  ought  to  have  been 
enough  to  keep  ennui  at  bay.  But  unfortunately  the 
pictures  I  conjured  up  were  so  colourless  and  in- 
substantial that  they  hid  neither  the  wall  paper  of 
my  room  nor  the  misty  countenance  that  I  abhorred. 
As  time  went  on,  I  did  better  and  succeeded  in  pro- 
viding myself,  as  I  lay  in  my  cot,  with  a  pastime  as 
agreeable  as  it  was  witty  and,  moreover,  one  very 
much  in  vogue  among  civilized  communities:  I  played 
me  a  comedy.  My  theatre,  I  need  hardly  say,  did 
not  attain  perfection  all  at  once.  Greek  tragedy, 
it  will  be  remembered,  had  its  origin  in  the  bucolic 
wain  of  Thespis.  I  used  to  hum  tunes,  beating  time 
with  my  hand.  Such  was  the  origin  of  my  Odeon. 
It  was  of  lowly  birth.  A  kindly  attack  of  measles 
kept  me  in  bed  that  I  might  bring  it  to  per- 
fection. I  had  five  actors  to  look  after,  or  rather 
five  characters,  like  those  of  the  Italian  comedy. 
They  were  the  five  fingers  of  my  right  hand.  Each 
had  his  own  name  as  well  as  his  distinctive  physi- 
ognomy. And  after  the  manner  of  the  masks  of 
the  Italian  theatre  on  the  resemblance  to  which  I 
cannot  too  greatly  insist,  my  dramatis  persona  kept 


LITTLE  PIERRE  77 

their  names  in  the  roles  they  played,  unless  of  course 
the  piece  made  a  change  obligatory,  as  sometimes 
happened,  in  historic  dramas  for  example.  But  they 
invariably  retained  their  characters.  In  this  respect, 
and  I  am  not  flattering  them,  they  were  never  found 
wanting. 

The  thumb  was  called  Rappart.  Why?  you  ask. 
I  cannot  tell.  We  must  not  expect  to  clear  up  every 
mystery.  It  is  impossible  to  explain  everything. 
Rappart  was  a  short,  broad,  thick-set  fellow  of 
prodigious  strength ;  an  uneducated,  violent,  quarrel- 
some, besotted  creature,  a  regular  Caliban,  black- 
smith, porter,  pantechnicon  man,  brigand,  soldier, 
according  to  the  part  he  was  playing.  Everything 
he  did  was  violent  and  cruel.  When  need  arose 
he  took  the  part  of  savage  beasts,  such  as  the  wolf 
in  Little  Red  Riding  Hood,  or  of  the  bear  in  a  rather 
nice  comedy  in  which  a  young  shepherdess  comes 
upon  a  white  bear  fast  asleep,  slips  a  ring  through 
his  nose  and  leads  him  captive  and  capering  to  the 
palace  of  the  King,  who  weds  her  forthwith. 

The  index  finger,  whose  name  was  Mitoufle,  pre- 
sented a  striking  contrast  to  Rappart  both  in  ap- 
pearance and  mentality.  Mitoufle  was  neither  the 
tallest  nor  the  handsomest  of  the  troop.  Indeed,  he 
seemed  a  little  defective  and  deformed  by  some 
manual  labour  undertaken  at  too  tender  an  age.  But 
for  vivacity  of  movement  and  talent  for  repartee  he 
was  the  best  of  my  actors.  Nature  had  endowed 


78  LITTLE  PIERRE 

him  with  a  big  heart  and  his  first  impulse  was  to 
hasten  to  succour  the  oppressed.  His  courage  was 
carried  to  the  point  of  rashness  and  the  dramatist 
gave  him  plenty  of  opportunities  to  display  it.  He 
hadn't  a  rival,  when  a  house  was  on  fire,  in  snatching 
a  baby  from  the  flames  and  restoring  it  to  its  mother. 
His  sole  defect  was  an  excess  of  sprightliness.  But 
for  that  we  forgave  him,  or  rather  we  loved  him 
the  better  for  it. 

"Achille  deplairait  moins  bouillant  et  moins  prompt." 

The  middle  finger,  elegant,  upright,  tall  and  proud 
of  mien,  harboured,  beneath  his  charming  exterior, 
a  chivalrous  soul.  Descended  from  the  most  illus- 
trious ancestry,  he  was  called  Dunois.  And  in  this 
instance  I've  a  strong  notion  that  I  know  how  he 
came  by  his  name.  I  don't  think  there  is  much  room 
for  doubt  that  my  mother  was  the  cause.  My  dear 
mother  was  not  a  very  good  singer  and  she  only 
sang  when  there  was  no  one  save  me  to  listen.  She 
used  to  sing: 

"Partant  pour  la  Syrie 
Le  jeune  et  beau  Dunois 
Alia  prier  Marie 
De  benir  ses  exploits." 

She  also  sang  Reposez-vous,  bans  chevaliers.  Nay, 
and  she  sang  too,  En  soupirant,  j'ai  vu  ncntre  I'au- 
rore.  My  dear  mother  thought  a  tremendous  lot  of 
the  ballads  of  Queen  Hortense,  which  were  con- 
sidered charming  in  those  days. 

Excuse  me  for  going  so  slowly;  but  it  is  a  whole 


LITTLE  PIERRE  79 

art  that  I  am  setting  forth.  The  ring-finger,  which 
bore  no  ring,  was  identified  with  a  lady  of  great 
beauty  named  Blanche  of  Castille.  It  was  very  likely 
a  pseudonym.  Being  the  only  woman  in  the  troop, 
she  took  the  part  of  mothers,  wives  and  sweethearts. 
Virtuous  and  persecuted,  she  was  rescued  times  with- 
out number  from  the  greatest  perils  by  the  young 
and  handsome  Dunois,  with  the  eager  and  unselfish 
assistance  of  Mitoufle.  She  often  married  Dunois, 
rarely  Mitoufle.  One  more  character  and  I  shall 
have  finished  with  my  troop.  Jeannot,  the  little  fin- 
ger, was  a  very  innocent  small  boy,  who,  when  neces- 
sary, became  a  girl,  as,  for  example,  when  the  piece 
was  Little  Red  Riding  Hood.  And  I  think  that, 
when  he  turned  into  a  girl,  his  wits  grew  sharper. 

The  plays  designed  for  the  interpreters  whom  I 
have  just  enumerated  resembled  the  commedia  del 
arte  in  this  respect,  namely,  that  I  composed  the  can- 
vas and  my  actors  improvised  the  dialogue,  adapting 
their  language  to  their  characters  and  situations.  In 
all  other  respects,  however,  they  differed  widely  from 
the  Italian  farce  and  the  pieces  enacted  in  booths 
at  country  fairs  where  Harlequin,  Columbine  and 
the  Doctor  engage  in  rivalry  for  sordid  interests 
and  ignoble  passions.  My  works  were  cast  in  a  no- 
bler mould  and  appertained  to  the  heroic  order,  as 
befits  the  innocent  and  the  simple-hearted.  I  was 
lyrical  and  I  was  pathetic,  tragic  and  very  tragic. 
When  passion  soared  to  heights  beyond  the  scope  of 


8o  LITTLE  PIERRE 

mortal  speech,  I  had  recourse  to  song.  My  dramas 
also  had  their  comic  scenes.  Thus  all  unwittingly 
I  composed  in  the  Shakespearean  manner.  I  should 
have  found  it  much  harder  to  have  imitated  Racine 
Unlike  M.  de  Lamartine,  I  had  no  rooted  detesta- 
tion of  buffoonery.  Far  from  it;  but  my  comic  scenes 
were  very  simple,  without  any  admixture  of  irony. 
The  same  situations  were  often  repeated  in  my  thea- 
tre. I  hadn't  the  heart  to  take  myself  to  task  on 
that  account;  they  were  so  touching!  Captive  prin- 
cesses set  free  by  valiant  knights,  children  kidnapped 
and  restored  to  their  mothers,  these  were  the  sub- 
jects I  loved  best. 

Nevertheless,  I  traced  out  other  stories  besides 
these.  I  composed  love  dramas,  lavishly  supplied 
with  ladies  of  conspicuous  beauty.  These  plays, 
however,  were  deficient  in  action  and,  more  espe- 
cially, lacking  in  denouement.  These  defects  really 
resulted  from  my  purity  of  mind,  for,  looking  on 
love  as  in  itself  its  own  sufficient  reward,  I  did  not 
consider  that  it  demanded  any  further  satisfaction. 
It  was  fine,  but  rather  tedious. 

I  also  dealt  with  warlike  subjects  and  was  not 
afraid  to  tackle  the  story  of  Napoleon,  which  I 
gathered  from  the  lips  of  survivors  of  those  glori- 
ous times,  for  they  were  numerous  about  me  in  my 
childhood  days.  Dunois  used  to  be  Napoleon; 
Blanche  of  Castille  was  Josephine  (I  knew  nothing 
about  Marie-Louise);  Mitoufle,  a  grenadier;  Jean- 


LITTLE  PIERRE  81 

not,  a  fifer.  Raopart  represented  the  English,  the 
Prussians,  the  Austrians  and  the  Russians,  that  is 
to  say,  the  enemy.  And  these  resources  sufficed  me 
to  win  the  battles  of  Austerlitz,  Jena,  Friedland  and 
Wagram  and  to  make  a  triumphal  entry  into  Vienna 
and  Berlin.  As  a  rule,  I  did  not  give  the  same  piece 
twice  over.  I  always  had  a  play  ready.  For  fer- 
tility I  was  a  veritable  Calderon. 

It  will  readily  be  appreciated  that,  thanks  to  the 
diversions  of  this  theatre  in  which  I  was  at  once 
manager,  author,  actors  and  audience,  I  did  not  have 
such  a  bad  time  of  it  in  bed.  Indeed,  I  used  to  re- 
main there  as  long  as  I  could  and  pretended  to  be 
suffering  from  all  sorts  of  ailments  in  order  not  to 
have  to  get  up.  My  dear  mamma,  who  did  not  know 
me  for  the  same  boy,  asked  me  how  it  was  I  had 
grown  so  lazy  all  of  a  sudden.  Not  understanding 
my  art  or  taking  the  measure  of  my  genius,  she 
applied  the  term  laziness  to  what  was  in  fact  action 
and  movement. 

This  theatre,  having  attained  its  zenith  about  my 
sixth  year,  fell  suddenly  into  a  rapid  decline  whereof 
it  behoves  me  to  explain  the  cause.  When  I  was 
about  six  years  old,  some  indisposition  incidental 
to  childhood  kept  me  several  days  in  bed  and,  hav- 
ing at  my  side  a  little  table,  a  box  of  paints  and 
some  pieces  of  ribbon,  I  decided  to  employ  the 
means  thus  ready  to  my  hand  in  embellishing  my 
theatre  and  in  bringing  it  to  a  state  of  perfection 


82  LITTLE  PIERRE 

hitherto  undreamt  of.  I  set  to  work  at  once  and 
carried  out  with  ardour  the  feverish  conceptions  of 
my  imagination.  It  had  never  struck  me  that  none 
of  my  actors  had  anything  more  in  the  way  of  physi- 
ognomy than  an  egg.  Suddenly  becoming  aware  of 
this  defect,  I  made  them  eyes,  noses,  mouths  and, 
perceiving  that  they  were  nude,  I  attired  them  in 
raiment  of  silk  and  gold.  It  next  occurred  to  me 
that  they  ought  to  have  something  on  their  heads 
and  I  made  them  hats  or  bonnets  of  divers  shapes 
but  for  the  most  part  pointed.  I  never  wearied  in 
my  quest  after  picturesque  effect.  I  built  a  stage, 
painted  scenery,  and  manufactured  accessories.  In 
an  access  of  great  emotion  I  produced  a  play  en- 
titled, "The  Knights  of  the  Holy  Sepulchre,"  in 
which  East  and  West  were  to  encounter  one  another 
in  a  formidable  combat.  Alas,  I  couldn't  even  get 
through  the  first  scene.  The  well-spring  of  inspira- 
tion had  been  frozen;  soul  and  movement,  all  had 
disappeared.  No  more  passion,  no  more  life.  My 
theatre,  so  long  as  it  had  remained  independent  of 
artifice,  had  put  on  all  the  hues  and  all  the  shapes 
of  illusion.  When  luxury  appeared  on  the  scene, 
illusion  faded  away.  The  Muses  took  wing.  They 
never  came  back.  What  a  lesson  was  there!  Art 
must  be  allowed  to  retain  its  noble  nudity.  Rich 
dresses  and  brilliant  scenery  stifle  drama,  whose  sole 
adornment  should  consist  in  the  grandeur  of  the 
action  and  the  truth  of  the  characters. 


CHAPTER  XI 

THE  LINT  MAKERS 

HAD  not  yet  completed  my  fourth 
year,  when,  one  morning,  my 
mother  took  me  out  of  my  bed 
and  my  dear  papa,  who  had  put  on 
his  National  Guard's  uniform,  em- 
braced me  tenderly.  On  his  shako 
he  had  a  golden  cock  and  a  crimson  tuft.  Down 
on  the  quay  the  drums  were  beating  to  arms.  The 
noise  of  galloping  horses  resounded  along  the 
cobbled  street.  From  time  to  time  there  came  the 
sound  of  singing  and  uproarious  shouting  and  in  the 
distance  the  rattle  of  musketry.  My  father  went 
out.  My  mother  went  to  the  window,  drew  aside 
the  muslin  curtain  and  fell  a-sobbing.  It  was  the 
Revolution. 

I  have  but  a  scanty  recollection  of  those  Feb- 
ruary days.  I  was  never  once  taken  out  while  the 
street  fighting  went  on.  Our  windows  looked  on 
to  the  courtyard  and  the  events  which  were  tak- 
ing place  in  the  outer  world  were,  for  me,  infinitely 
mysterious.  All  the  tenants  began  to  fraternize 
with  each  other.  Madame  Caumont,  the  wife  of 

the     bookseller      and      publisher;      Mademoiselle 

83 


84  LITTLE  PIERRE 

Mathilde,  the  daughter,  already  well  on  in  years,  of 
Madame  Laroque;  Mademoiselle  Cecile,  the  dress- 
maker; the  very  elegant  Madame  Petitpas;  the  beau- 
tiful Madame  Moser  who,  in  ordinary  times,  used 
to  get  the  cold  shoulder  from  every  one,  all  fore- 
gathered at  my  mother's  to  make  bandages  for  the 
wounded,  whose  numbers  increased  every  minute. 
The  custom  then  followed  in  all  the  hospitals,  was 
to  apply  linen  threads  to  the  wounds,  and  no  one 
entertained  any  doubts  as  to  the  wisdom  of  this  treat- 
ment until  a  revolution  in  surgery  prescribed  the  ap- 
plication of  moist  dressings.  Each  of  these  ladies 
brought  her  parcel  of  linen.  They  sat  in  the  dining- 
room  round  the  circular  table  and  tore  the  linen 
into  narrow  strips  which  they  then  proceeded  to  un- 
ravel. It  was  wonderful,  when  one  comes  to  think 
of  it,  what  a  quantity  of  old  linen  these  housewives 
possessed.  On  a  piece  of  an  old  shirt  which  she  had 
brought  with  her,  Madame  Petitpas  deciphered  the 
monogram  of  her  maternal  grandmother  and  the 
date  1745.  Mamma  took  part  in  the  work  with  her 
guests.  We,  young  Octave  Caumont  and  myself, 
likewise  bore  a  hand  in  this  labour  of  mercy,  under 
the  controlling  eye  of  old  Melanie  who,  with  her 
toil-hardened  hands  was  unravelling  muslin,  sitting, 
out  of  deference  to  the  company,  a  foot  or  two  away 
from  the  table.  For  myself,  I  was  acquitting  myself 
of  my  task  with  zeal,  and  my  pride  went  on  increas- 
ing with  every  thread  I  drew  out.  But,  when  I  per- 


LITTLE  PIERRE  85 

ceived  that  Octave  Caumont's  pile  was  bigger  than 
mine,  my  amour-propre  was  wounded  and  my  satis- 
faction at  preparing  these  comforts  for  the  wounded 
suffered  a  sensible  abatement. 

From  time  to  time  some  good  friend  of  ours,  M. 
Debas,  surnamed  Simon  de  Nantua,  or  M.  Caumont, 
the  publisher,  would  come  in  and  tell  us  how  matters 
were  progressing. 

M.  Caumont  had  on  the  uniform  of  the  National 
Guard,  but  he  was  far  from  wearing  it  with  the  ele- 
gance of  my  dear  papa.  My  papa's  complexion  was 
pale  and  his  figure  slender  and  graceful.  M.  Cau- 
mont had  a  puffy,  rubicund  countenance,  and  the 
folds  of  a  triple  chin  reposed  upon  his  tunic  front. 
Moreover,  he  was  too  fat  to  get  it  to,  and  it  gaped 
ingloriously  over  the  stomach  part. 

"Things  are  in  a  terrible  state,"  he  said.  "Paris 
in  flames,  the  streets  bristling  with  seven  hundred 
barricades,  the  mob  besieging  the  Chateau,  Marshal 
Bugeaud  defending  it  with  four  thousand  men  and 
six  pieces  of  artillery." 

These  tidings  were  received  with  the  liveliest 
manifestations  of  terror  and  pity.  The  aged 
Melanie,  seated  apart  from  the  rest,  kept  making 
the  sign  of  the  cross  and  moving  her  lips  in  silent 
prayer. 

My  mother  ordered  sherry  and  biscuits  to  be  put 
on  the  table.  (Tea  was  very  seldom  drunk  in  those 
days,  and  ladies  were  more  accustomed  to  drink  wine 


86  LITTLE  PIERRE 

than  they  are  now.)  A  sip  of  sherry  brought  a 
sparkle  to  their  eyes  and  a  smile  to  their  lips.  You 
wouldn't  have  thought  they  were  the  same  faces,  or 
the  same  people. 

While  refreshments  were  being  taken,  M.  Clerot, 
carver  and  gilder  of  the  Quai  Malaquais,  presented 
himself  before  us.  He  was  a  very  stout  man,  far 
stouter  than  M.  Caumont,  and  his  white  blouse  made 
him  look  rounder  than  ever.  He  bov/ed  to  the  com- 
pany, and  begged  that  Dr.  Noziere  would  come  to 
the  Palais  Royal  and  see  to  the  wounded  who  were 
lying  there  helpless  and  neglected.  My  mother  re- 
plied that  Dr.  Noziere  was  at  the  Charity  Hospital. 
M.  Clerot  gave  us  a  terrible  account  of  what  he  had 
seen  near  the  Tuileries.  Dead  and  wounded  all 
about  the  place,  horses  with  one  leg  broken,  or  with 
gaping  wound.s  in  their  bellies,  trying  to  get  on  their 
feet  and  falling  down  again,  and  notwithstanding  all 
that,  the  cafes  filled  with  people  out  to  see  what  they 
could  see,  and  a  group  of  street  arabs  making  game 
of  a  dog  that  was  howling  beside  a  corpse.  He  told 
how  the  guard-house  of  the  Chateau-d'Eau,  be- 
sieged by  a  heavy  column  of  rebels  equipped  with 
arms  and  munitions,  was  enveloped  in  flames,  and 
how  its  defenders  at  length  laid  down  their  arms. 

M.  Clerot  continued  his  narrative  somewhat  as 
follows : 

"After  the  surrender  of  the  guard,  volunteers 
were  called  for  to  help  put  the  fire  out.  I  happened 


LITTLE  PIERRE  87 

to  be  among  the  number;  we  procured  some  buckets 
and  formed  up  in  a  line.  I  was  stationed  about  fifty 
paces  from  the  burning  mass  between  a  respectable 
middle-aged  citizen  and  a  slip  of  a  boy  who  was 
wearing  a  military  cartridge  box  slung  over  his 
shoulder.  The  buckets  were  passed  to  and  fro. 
'Steady,  there,  citizens!'  said  I.  'Steady!'  I  was 
not  feeling  very  well.  The  wind  was  blowing  the 
flames  and  the  smoke  right  in  our  faces.  My  feet 
were  as  cold  as  ice,  and  every  now  and  then  I  felt 
a  deathly  chill  pass  right  down  my  leg.  I  tried  to 
discover  the  cause,  but  could  not.  At  last  I  began 
to  wonder  whether  I  had  been  wounded  in  the  com- 
bat without  noticing  it,  and  was  losing  all  my  blood, 
and  as  I  stood  there  in  the  line  I  said  to  myself, 
'This  feeling  isn't  natural,'  and  I  looked  in  front, 
behind,  right  and  left,  to  find  out  what  was  happen- 
ing to  me.  But  would  you  believe  it,  all  of  a  sudden 
I  caught  my  left-hand  neighbour,  the  boy,  busily 
emptying  the  contents  of  the  bucket  I  had  just  passed 
to  him,  into  the  pocket  of  my  blouse.  Ladies,  the 
young  rascal  got  a  beautiful  box  on  the  ears,  and  I 
hope  he  will  go  and  show  it  to  his  lady-love.  And 
now,  if  you  would  be  so  kind,  Madame  Noziere,  I 
should  be  very  glad  to  warm  myself  for  a  minute  or 
two  by  your  fire.  The  young  beggar  has  chilled  me 
to  the  bont.  It's  enough  to  make  you  shudder  to 
think  that  youngsters  nowadays  don't  know  better 
than  to  behave  like  that." 


88  LITTLE  PIERRE 

And  the  obese  gentleman,  having  extracted  from 
his  pocket  a  three-foot  rule,  a  glazier's  diamond,  and 
a  newspaper  reduced  to  a  paste,  turned  it  inside  out 
all  dripping  with  water.  He  pulled  up  his  blouse, 
and  soon  his  clothes  began  to  steam  in  the  heat  of 
the  fire.  My  mother  poured  him  out  a  glass  of 
brandy,  which  he  drank  to  the  health  of  the  com- 
pany, for  he  knew  his  manners.  I  thought  it  all  tre- 
mendously exciting,  and  I  plainly  saw  Madame  Cau- 
mont  making  frantic  endeavours  to  prevent  herself 
exploding  with  laughter. 

At  this  juncture,  M.  Debas,  surnamed  Simon  de 
Nantua,  appeared  on  the  scene,  rifle  in  hand.  He 
was  wearing  his  belt  and  shoulder-straps  buckled  on 
over  his  frock  coat.  He  bore  himself  with  an  air  of 
extreme  importance,  and  in  tones  of  great  solemnity 
informed  Madame  Noziere  that  the  doctor  was  de- 
tained at  the  hospital,  and  would  not  be  home  to 
dinner.  He  told  us  all  about  the  things  he  had  seen 
or  heard,  devoting  himself  chiefly  to  the  events  in 
which  he  had  personally  participated:  six  municipal 
guards  chased  by  the  rebels  and  concealed  by  him  in 
a  cellar  in  the  Rue  de  Beaune;  a  royal  outrider, 
whose  scarlet  coat  would  have  made  him  a  certain 
victim  of  the  infuriated  populace,  taken  by  him  to  a 
wine  shop  at  the  corner  of  the  Rue  de  Verneuil  and 
there  disguised  in  a  cellarman's  overall.  He  told  us 
that  Firmin,  M.  Bellaguet's  valet,  had  just  been 
killed  on  the  quay  by  a  stray  bullet ;  and,  as  we  are 


LITTLE  PIERRE  89 

principally  moved  by  the  things  which  happen  in  our 
own  neighbourhood,  this  last  piece  of  news  upset  us 
all  greatly. 

I  also  remember  that  a  little  while  later,  when 
darkness  had  come  on  and  I  was  at  Madame  Cau- 
mont's  with  my  dear  mamma,  I  peered  through  the 
entresol  window,  which  looked  on  to  the  quay,  and 
saw  a  cart  piled  with  a  very  tall  and  bulky  freight 
coming  through  the  gates  of  the  Louvre,  all  on  fire. 
A  lot  of  men  dragged  it  along  on  to  the  Pont  des 
Saints-Peres  between  the  two-seated  statues,  and 
when  they  reached  the  middle  of  the  bridge  they 
tipped  it  up.  It  rebounded  twice  on  its  springs,  and 
then,  carrying  away  the  cast-iron  railings,  toppled 
over  into  the  Seine.  This  sight,  which  was  suddenly 
followed  by  utter  darkness,  struck  me  as  splendid 
and  mysterious. 

Those  are  my  recollections  of  the  24th.  February, 
1848,  as  they  impressed  themselves  on  my  childish 
mind,  and  as  my  mother  has  time  and  again  recalled 
them  to  me.  There  you  have  them  in  their  naked 
artlessness.  I  have  been  very  careful  not  to  dress 
them  up,  not  to  add  any  sort  of  embellishment. 

The  manner  in  which  I  then  became  acquainted 
with  current  events  permanently  influenced  my  atti- 
tude towards  public  life  and  went  a  long  way 
towards  building  up  my  philosophy  of  history.  In 
my  earliest  childhood,  French  people  had  a  sense  of 
the  ludicrous  which,  under  the  influences  of  causes 


90  LITTLE  PIERRE 

that  I  am  unable  to  define,  they  have  since  lost. 
In  pamphlet,  in  picture,  and  in  song,  their  mocking 
spirit  was  manifest.  I  was  born  in  the  golden  age 
of  caricature,  and  it  was  from  the  lithographs  of  the 
Charivari  and  the  quips  of  my  godfather,  M.  Pierre 
Danquin,  a  typical  Paris  bourgeois,  that  I  acquired 
my  ideas  of  national  life.  It  struck  me  as  comic,  in 
spite  of  the  riots  and  revolutions  amid  which  I  was 
brought  up.  My  godfather  used  to  call  Louis  Na- 
poleon Bonaparte  the  moping  parrot.  I  used  to  de- 
light in  picturing  this  bird  as  doing  battle  with  the 
Red  Terror,  the  Red  Terror  being  represented  as  a 
scarecrow  tied  to  the  end  of  a  broom  handle.  And 
round  about  them  I  saw  the  Orleanists  with  pear- 
shaped  heads,  M.  Thiers  as  a  dwarf,  Girardin  as  a 
Merry  Andrew,  and  President  Dupin  with  a  face 
like  a  colander  and  shoes  as  big  as  boats.  But  I  was 
especially  interested  in  Victor  Considerant  who,  I 
knew,  lived  close  by,  on  the  Quai  Voltaire,  and  who 
appeared  to  me  as  hanging  from  the  branches  of 
trees  by  a  long  tail,  with  a  great  big  eye  at  the  tip 
of  it. 


CHAPTER  XII 

THE  TWO  SISTERS 

T  that  time,  my  mamma  frequently 
took  me  down  the  Rue  du  Bac. 
Winter  was  coming  on,  and  in  that 
busy  street  she  purchased  knitted 
things  and  all  sorts  of  woollen 
garments,  and  ordered  a  warm  suit 
for  me  from  M.  Augris,  a  tailor  equally  notable 
for  his  courtesy  and  his  incompetence.  His  shop 
was  opposite  the  house  where  M.  de  Chateau- 
briand had  died  the  year  before.  This  con- 
sideration affected  me  but  little,  and  I  glanced 
but  casually  at  the  doorway,  adorned  with  medal- 
lions in  a  chaste  and  dignified  style,  which  had 
opened  to  let  him  pass  out  never  to  return.  What 
especially  delighted  me  in  the  beautiful  Rue  du  Bac 
were  the  shops  full  of  objects  marvellous  in  form 
and  colour,  tapestry  in  infinite  variety,  note-paper 
with  letters  engraved  in  gold  and  azure,  lions  and 
panthers  figured  on  bed  hangings,  heads  modelled 
in  wax  with  the  hair  most  beautifully  dressed,  Savoy 
biscuits  of  which  the  dome,  like  the  dome  of  the 
Pantheon,  was  surmounted  by  a  full  blown  rose; 

then,  too,  there  were  wondrous  little  pastries  in  the 

91 


92  LITTLE  PIERRE 

shape  of  three-cornered  hats  and  dominoes  and  man- 
dolins. As  she  showed  me  these  marvels,  my  mother 
added  a  word  or  two  that  made  them  more  marvel- 
lous still,  for  she  had  the  rare  gift  of  giving  every- 
thing a  soul  and  of  infusing  mere  symbols  with  life. 
At  the  corner  of  this  street  and  the  Rue  de  1'Uni- 
versite,  there  used  to  live  a  picture-dealer,  the  en- 
trance to  whose  shop  was  through  a  somewhat  nar- 
row doorway  painted  yellow  and  decorated  in  the 
contemporary  manner,  with  a  certain  richness  of 
ornamentation.  Of  the  cornice  which  surmounted 
it,  I  can  say  nothing,  for  I  have  no  recollection  of  it, 
but  it  is  certain  that,  leaning  their  backs  against  the 
two  consoles  which  supported  that  cornice,  there 
were  two  little  figures  about  as  long  as  one's  arm, 
weirdly  partaking  of  the  characteristics  of  man, 
bird,  and  beast.  They  were  not,  strictly  speaking, 
chimeras,  for  they  in  no  way  proceeded  from  the 
lion  or  the  goat,  nor  were  they  griffins,  since  they 
had  a  woman's  breasts.  Long  ears  stuck  up  from 
their  heads,  which  were  something  like  a  bat's.  Their 
thin,  lithe  bodies  were  of  the  greyhound  order.  On 
the  lamp  brackets  of  the  Pont  de  Suresnes,  there  are 
some  fantastic  little  creatures  somewhat  resembling 
them,  and  they  were  also  a  little  like  a  monster  that 
supported  a  lantern  on  the  fagade  of  the  Palazzo 
Riccardi  at  Florence.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  they  were 
little  decorative  figures  executed  somewhere  about 
the  year  1840  by  Feuchere,  or  one  of  his  school,  but 


LITTLE  PIERRE  93 

they  were  endowed  with  a  very  singular  physiog- 
nomy, and  they  fill  much  too  important  a  place  in 
my  life  for  me  to  mix  them  up  with  any  other  carving 
of  a  similar  description. 

My  mother  it  was  who  pointed  them  out  to  me 
one  day  as  we  were  passing  by. 

"Pierre,  look  at  those  little  creatures,"  she  said. 
"They  have  a  lot  of  expression.  Their  faces  are 
full  of  gaiety  and  mischief.  One  could  look  at  them 
for  hours  together,  so  sprightly  and  so  full  of  life 
they  seem." 

I  asked  what  their  names  were.  My  mother  re- 
plied that  they  had  no  names  in  Natural  History 
because  they  did  not  exist  in  Nature. 

"They  are  the  two  sisters,"  I  said. 

We  had  to  go  back  next  day  for  M.  Augris  to  try 
on  my  winter  suit  again.  As  we  passed  by  the  two 
sisters,  my  dear  mamma  gravely  pointed  them  out 
to  me  with  her  finger. 

"Look,"  said  she,  "they  are  not  laughing  now." 

And  mamma  spoke  truly. 

The  expression  of  the  two  sisters  had  changed. 
They  laughed  no  more.  They  had  a  grim  and 
threatening  aspect. 

I  asked  why  they  had  ceased  to  laugh. 

"Because  you  have  not  been  a  good  boy  to-day." 

There  was  no  gainsaying  that.  I  had  not  been 
good  that  day.  I  had  gone  into  the  kitchen,  whither 
my  heart  ever  impelled  me  to  go,  and  where  I  had 


94  LITTLE  PIERRE 

found  old  Melanie  peeling  turnips.  I  wanted  to 
peel  them,  too,  or  rather  to  carve  them,  for  I  medi- 
tated moulding  them  into  the  shapes  of  men  and 
animals.  Melaine  objected.  Annoyed  at  her  op- 
position, I  clutched  hold  of  her  goffered  cap  with  its 
lace  wings,  and  tore  it  off  her  head.  A  wild  impul- 
sive genius  might  have  done  a  thing  like  that;  it  was 
certainly  not  the  deed  of  a  good  boy.  I  turned  my 
gaze  on  the  two  sisters,  and,  whether  it  was  that 
they  really  did  appear  to  me  to  be  endowed  with 
supernatural  power,  or  whether  it  was  that  my  mind, 
hungering  after  the  marvellous,  assisted  the  illusion, 
a  little  shiver  of  fear,  half  joy,  half  terror,  made  my 
heart  quake. 

"They  do  not  know  the  naughty  things  you  have 
done,"  said  my  mother,  "but  you  may  read  them  in 
their  eyes.  Be  good  and  they  will  smile  upon  you, 
they  and  all  Nature  with  them." 

Since  then,  every  time  we  passed  by  the  two  sis- 
ters, my  mother  and  I,  we  scanned  them  anxiously, 
to  see  whether  their  faces  were  wrathful  or  serene, 
and  always  their  expression  corresponded  exactly 
with  the  state  of  my  conscience.  I  consulted  them 
in  the  fullness  of  faith,  and  found  in  their  counte- 
nance, whether  smiling  or  sombre,  the  recompense 
of  my  good  behaviour,  or  the  penalty  of  my  mis- 
deeds. 

Long  years  slipped  by.  Having  attained  to  man's 
estate  and  complete  intellectual  emancipation,  I  still 


LITTLE  PIERRE  95 

used  to  consult  the  two  sisters  in  hours  of  perplexity 
and  irresolution.  One  day,  when  I  had  a  special  need 
to  read  clearly  within  my  heart,  I  went  to  ask  them 
for  guidance.  They  were  no  longer  to  be  seen. 
They  had  disappeared,  together  with  the  door  that 
they  adorned.  I  departed  filled  with  doubt  and 
hesitation,  and  forthwith  committed  an  error  of 
judgment 


CHAPTER  XIII 

CATHERINE  AND  MARIANNE 

HE  sea,  when  I  saw  it  for  the  first 
time,  only  impressed  me  with  its 
vastness  by  reason  of  the  infinite 
sadness  which  it  brought  into  my 
heart  as  I  gazed  upon  it  and 
breathed  its  salt  savour.  It  was  the 
sea,  wild  and  untamed.  We  had  come  to  spend  one 
of  the  summer  months  at  a  little  village  in  Brittany, 
and  one  aspect  of  the  coast  is  graven,  as  though  with 
an  etcher's  needle,  on  my  memory,  and  that  was  the 
sight  of  a  row  of  trees  beaten  by  the  sea  wind  and 
stretching,  beneath  a  lowering  sky,  their  bowed 
trunks  and  withered  branches  towards  the  flat,  bar- 
ren soil. 

It  was  a  sight  that  ate  itself  into  my  heart.  It 
lingers  with  me  as  the  symbol  of  some  unparalleled 
misfortune. 

The  sounds  and  scents  of  the  sea  haunted  and 
troubled  me.  Every  day  and  every  hour,  the  sea 
seemed  to  me  to  undergo  a  change,  now  sleek  and 
blue,  now  overspread  with  tiny,  gentle  wavelets,  blue 
on  one  side,  silvery  on  the  other,  now  seemingly  hid- 
den beneath  a  sheet  of  polished  green  canvas,  now 

96 


LITTLE  PIERRE  97 

heavy  and  sombre  and  bearing  on  its  tossing  crests 
the  tameless  herds  of  Nereus;  yesterday  coy  and 
smiling;  to-day  tumultuous  and  threatening.  Little 
child  as  I  was,  and  indeed  because  I  was  but  a  poor 
little  child,  this  treacherous  instability  greatly  les- 
sened the  confidence  and  affection  wherewith  Nature 
inspired  me.  The  living  things  of  the  sea,  fish  that 
swam,  fish  that  dwelt  in  shells,  and  especially  the 
crustaceous  creatures,  were  more  terrifying  than  the 
monsters  that  gathered  round  St.  Anthony  in  the 
hour  of  his  temptation,  monsters  which  I  had  been 
wont  to  examine  with  such  curiosity  on  Madame 
Letord's  stall,  on  my  own  Quai  Malaquais.  Those 
crayfish,  octopuses,  star-fish,  and  crabs  told  me  of 
forms  of  life  that  were  too  dreadfully  uncanny, 
creatures  that  assuredly  had  less  of  brotherly  love 
about  them  than  my  little  dog  Caire,  than  Madame 
Caumont's  pony,  than  Robinson  Crusoe's  asses,  than 
the  Paris  sparrows,  less  of  friendliness  than  the  lions 
in  my  picture  Bible,  and  the  animals  in  my  Noah's 
Ark.  These  denizens  of  the  deep  pursued  me  even 
in  my  dreams,  and  came  to  me,  by  night,  vague  and 
vast  in  their  horny  coverings  of  bluish  black,  prickly 
and  hairy,  armed  with  pincers  and  saws,  without 
faces,  and  more  terrifying  on  that  account  than  on 
any  other. 

The  very  next  day  after  my  arrival,  I  was  enrolled 
by  a  big  boy  in  a  troop  of  children  who,  furnished 
with  picks  and  shovels,  built  a  sand  castle  on  the 


98  LITTLE  PIERRE 

beach,  planted  the  French  flag  thereon,  and  defended 
it  against  the  advancing  tide.  We  were  defeated 
with  honour.  I  was  one  of  the  last  to  quit  the  dis- 
mantled fort,  having  done  my  duty,  but  accepting 
defeat  with  a  ready  acquiescence  that  scarcely  be- 
tokened a  warlike  spirit. 

One  day  I  went  out  in  a  boat  with  Jean  £16  to 
catch  shell-fish.  Jean  filo  had  light  blue  eyes.  His 
face  was  tanned  and  sun  cured,  and  his  hands  so 
rough  that  they  scraped  my  own  when  he  took  hold 
of  them  to  show  his  love  for  me.  He  went  out  to  sea 
to  catch  fish,  he  mended  his  nets,  he  caulked  his  boat, 
and  occupied  his  spare  time  in  building  a  fully  rigged 
schooner  in  a  water  bottle.  Though  he  was  but  little 
given  to  talking,  he  told  me  his  history,  which  con- 
sisted solely  of  descriptions  of  the  death  of  his  rela- 
tives and  connections  who  had  perished  at  sea.  His 
father  and  three  of  his  brothers  had  all  been 
drowned  together  the  winter  before,  wherein,  as  in 
everything  else  that  happened,  he  saw  naught  but 
good.  What  religion  I  possessed  led  me  to  regard 
Jean  £16  as  one  gifted  with  celestial  wisdom.  One 
Sunday  evening  we  discovered  him  lying  on  the  path 
dead  drunk,  and  we  were  obliged  to  step  over  him. 
He  was  none  the  less  perfect  in  my  eyes.  Perhaps 
the  sentiment  arose  from  a  leaning  towards  Quiet- 
ism on  my  part.  But  I  leave  that  for  others  to  de- 
cide ;  theology  was  not  my  strong  point  in  those  days ; 
it  is  a  good  deal  less  so  to-day. 


LITTLE  PIERRE  99 

My  dearest  delight  was  to  go  shrimping  with  two 
little  girls  who  inspired  me  with  a  fairylike  and  fleet- 
ing affection.  One  of  them,  Marianne  Le  Guerrec, 
was  the  daughter  of  a  Quimper  lady,  with  whom 
my  mother  had  struck  up  an  acquaintance  on  the 
beach;  the  other,  Catherine  O'Brien,  was  Irish. 
Both  of  them  had  fair  hair  and  blue  eyes.  They 
were  very  much  alike, which  need  not  excite  surprise : 

"Car  les  vierges  d'Erin  et  les  viergcs  d'Armor 
Sont  des  fruits  detaches  du  meme  rameau  d'or." 

Prompted  by  a  secret,  instinctive  grace  to  inter- 
weave their  movements,  they  were  always  to  be  seen 
arm  linked  in  arm  or  hand  clasped  in  hand.  Keep- 
ing time  with  their  slender  bare  legs  bronzed  by  the 
sun  and  sea  water,  they  raced  along  the  sand,  turn- 
ing and  twisting  as  though  weaving  some  mazy 
dance.  Catherine  O'Brien  was  the  prettier  of  the 
two,  but  she  spoke  French  badly,  and  that  puzzled 
me  somewhat.  I  looked  for  pretty  shells  to  give 
them,  and  these  they  disdained.  I  went  out  of  my 
way  to  do  them  little  services  which  they  either  pre- 
tended not  to  notice  or  to  be  overcome  by  them. 
When  I  looked  at  them  they  turned  away  their  heads, 
but  if,  in  turn,  I  feigned  not  to  see  them,  they  at- 
tracted my  attention  by  some  prank  or  other.  They 
used  to  make  me  nervous,  and  at  their  approach  I 
forgot  all  the  things  I  had  intended  to  say  to  them. 
If  I  spoke  to  them  roughly  sometimes,  it  was  due  to 
fear  or  spite  or  some  inexplicable  perversity.  Man- 


ioo  LITTLE  PIERRE 

anne  and  Catherine  were  at  one  in  making  fun  of 
the  little  girl  bathers  of  their  own  age.  On  all  other 
matters  they  were  more  often  quarrelling  than  not. 
They  made  it  a  mutual  grievance  that  they  had  not 
been  born  in  the  same  country.  Marianne  bitterly 
reproached  Catherine  for  being  English.  Catherine, 
who  hated  England,  flared  up  at  the  insult,  stamped 
her  foot,  ground  her  teeth,  and  cried  that  she  was 
Irish.  But  Marianne  didn't  see  the  difference.  One 
day,  in  Madame  O'Brien's  bungalow,  they  came  to 
blows  about  their  respective  countries.  Marianne 
came  to  us  on  the  beach  with  her  face  all  scratches. 
"Goodness  gracious,  what  has  happened  to  you?" 
exclaimed  her  mother  when  she  saw  her. 
Marianne's  reply  was  very  simple: 
"Catherine  teased  me  because  I  am  French,  and 
so  I  called  her  an  ugly  English  thing,  and  gave  her 
a  punch  on  the  nose  and  made  it  bleed.  Madame 
O'Brien  sent  us  both  up  to  Catherine's  room  to  wash, 
and  we  made  it  up  because  there  was  only  one  basin 
between  us." 


THE  UNKNOWN  WORLD 

VERY  day,  when  lunch  was  over,  old 
Melanie  went  up  to  her  attic  and 
put  on  her  flat  shiny  shoes,  tied  the 
strings  of  her  white  lace  bonnet 
before  her  glass,  wrapped  her  little 
black  shawl  across  her  chest,  and 
fastened  it  with  a  pin.  She  performed  all  these 
things  with  studious  attention  to  detail,  for,  in 
every  department  of  activity,  art  is  difficult,  and 
Melanie  left  nothing  to  chance  in  respect  of 
those  things  which  she  deemed  calculated  to  render 
the  human  body  respectable,  seemly,  and  worthy 
of  its  divine  origin.  Satisfied  at  length  that  she 
had  befittingly  attended  to  all  the  externals  re- 
quired of  her  sex,  age  and  condition,  she  locked 
the  door  of  her  room,  went  downstairs  with  me, 
stopped  dumbfounded  in  the  hall,  gave  vent  to 
a  loud  exclamation,  and  hurried  upstairs  again  to  her 
garret  to  fetch  her  bag,  which  she  had  left  behind, 
in  accordance  with  her  long  established  custom.  She 
would  never  have  been  prevailed  upon  to  go  out 
without  the  red  velvet  bag  which  contained  her  ever- 
lasting knitting,  and  from  which  she  would  pull  out 


1 01 


102  LITTLE  PIERRE 

her  scissors,  needle  and  thread  when  she  needed 
them,  from  which,  too,  on  one  occasion  she  had  pro- 
duced a  little  square  piece  of  court  plaster  to  put  on 
my  finger  which  was  bleeding.  She  still  kept  in  this 
bag  of  hers  a  sou  with  a  hole  in  it,  one  of  my  first 
teeth,  and  her  address  written  on  a  scrap  of  paper, 
in  order,  she  said,  that,  if  she  dropped  down 
dead  in  the  street,  she  might  not  be  taken  to  the 
Morgue.  Whenever,  having  reached  the  quay,  we 
turned  to  the  left,  we  always  used  to  go  and  say 
"How  do  you  do?"  to  Madame  Petit,  the  spectacle- 
seller.  Madame  Petit  had  her  establishment  in  the 
open  air,  alongside  the  wall  of  the  Hotel  de  Chimay, 
and  there  she  sat  by  her  glass-case,  on  a  high  wooden 
chair,  bolt  upright  and  motionless,  her  face  seared 
by  the  sun  and  frost,  in  an  attitude  of  gloomy  aus- 
terity. The  two  women  would  exchange  remarks 
which  varied  little  from  one  meeting  to  another, 
doubtless  because  they  related  to  the  basic  and  un- 
changing facts  of  human  nature. 

They  spoke  of  children  suffering  from  whooping 
cough  or  croup,  of  children  wasting  away  with  low 
fever ;  of  women  and  their  more  mysterious  ailments ; 
of  workmen  cut  off  by  terrible  accidents.  They 
spoke  of  the  ill  effects  of  the  changing  seasons  on 
one's  health;  of  the  high  cost  of  victuals;  of  the 
growing  rapacity  of  men,  who,  as  a  class,  were  get- 
ting worse  and  worse  every  day,  and  of  the  fearful 
number  of  crimes  that  filled  the  world  with  horror. 


LITTLE  PIERRE  103 

I  observed  later  on,  when  I  came  to  read  Hesiod, 
that  the  spectacle-seller  of  the  Quai  Malaquais 
thought  and  spoke  even  as  the  old  gnomic  poets  of 
Greece. 

So  far  from  exciting  my  admiration,  this  wisdom 
bored  me  beyond  measure,  and  I  tugged  my  nurse 
by  the  skirt  in  order  to  get  away  from  it.  If,  how- 
ever, on  reaching  the  quay,  we  turned  to  the  right 
instead  of  to  the  left,  I  was  always  ready  to  stop 
and  look  at  the  pictures  which  Madame  Letord  used 
to  display  along  by  a  wooden  fence  which  enclosed 
the  piece  of  waste  ground  on  which  the  Palais  des 
Beaux-Arts  now  stands.  These  pictures  filled  me 
with  wonder  and  admiration.  Above  all  Napoleon's 
Farewell  at  Fontainebleau;  The  Creation  of  Eve; 
The  Mountain  shaped  like  a  man's  head  and  The 
Death  of  Virginiei  awoke  in  me  an  emotion  that  even 
now,  after  all  these  years,  has  not  completely  sub- 
sided. But  old  Melanie  pulled  me  along  and  would 
not  let  me  linger,  either  because  she  did  not  think 
me  of  a  proper  age  to  examine  all  these  pictures  or, 
which  is  more  probable,  because  she  herself  could 
make  nothing  of  them;  for  the  fact  is  that  she  paid 
no  more  heed  to  them  than  did  our  little  dog  Caire. 

We  went  sometimes  to  the  Tuileries,  sometimes  to 
the  Luxembourg.  When  the  weather  was  mild  and 
fine,  we  extended  our  walk  as  far  as  the  Jardin  des 
Plantes  or  the  Trocadero,  in  those  days  a  lonely  hill 
beside  the  Seine,  grassy  and  flower  bedecked.  There 


104  LITTLE  PIERRE 

were  some  lucky  days  when  they  took  me  to  play  in 
M.  de  La  B's  garden,  permission  to  go  there  being 
granted  me  during  the  owner's  absence.  This  gar- 
den was  cool  and  sequestered,  and  was  planted  with 
tall  trees.  It  was  situated  at  the  back  of  a  fine 
house  in  the  Rue  Saint-Dominique.  I  brought  with 
me  a  wooden  spade  about  the  size  of  my  hand,  and 
when  it  was  the  time  of  year  for  the  plane-trees  to 
shed  their  smooth,  thin  bark,  and  when,  at  the  bot- 
tom of  their  trunks,  the  mould  had  been  softened  by 
the  rain  and  streaked  with  little  winding  furrows 
which  became  ravines  and  precipices  in  my  imagina- 
tion, I  spanned  them  with  little  wooden  bridges,  and, 
at  their  edge,  built  villages,  ramparts,  and  churches 
fashioned  from  the  slender  bark.  I  brought  blades 
of  grass  and  branches  to  represent  trees,  and  laid  out 
gardens,  avenues  and  forests.  And  I  was  well 
pleased  with  my  handiwork. 

Those  walks  in  city  and  suburb  sometimes  seemed 
to  me  tedious  and  monotonous,  sometimes  exciting, 
sometimes  irksome,  occasionally  delightful  and  full 
of  gaiety.  Ranging  over  wide  tracts,  we  used  to  go 
down  that  long  avenue  bravely  bordered  by  shops 
where  they  sold  gingerbread,  sticks  of  barley  sugar, 
penny  whistles,  paper  kites,  the  Champs-£lysees,  to 
wit,  where  there  were  goat  carriages  too,  and 
wooden  horses  revolving  to  the  sound  of  the  steam 
organ,  and  Guignol,  in  his  theatre,  doing  battle  with 
the  Devil;  and  then  we  would  find  ourselves  on  dirty 


LITTLE  PIERRE  105 

wharves  with  cranes  busily  unloading  cargoes  of 
stone,  while  on  the  towing  path  horses  tugged  away 
at  heavy  barges.  Scene  followed  scene,  landscape 
succeeded  landscape,  populous  or  deserted,  barren 
or  cultivated;  but  there  was  one  region  into  whose 
confines  I  longed  beyond  all  others  to  penetrate,  one 
which,  at  certain  moments,  I  thought  I  was  on  the 
point  of  attaining,  but  which  I  reached  never.  I 
knew  nothing  about  this  region,  and  yet  I  was  sure 
that  when  I  beheld  it  I  should  recognize  it.  I  did 
not  picture  it  as  fairer  or  more  pleasant  than  the 
places  I  knew  already — quite  the  reverse — but  as 
something  completely  different,  and  it  was  my  ardent 
ambition  to  discover  it.  This  region,  this  world, 
which  I  felt  to  be  inaccessible  yet  near  at  hand,  was 
not  that  divine  world  whereof  my  mother  taught  me. 
For  me  that  world,  the  spiritual  world,  was  strange- 
ly co-mingled  in  my  mind  with  the  world  of  sense. 
God  the  Father,  Jesus,  the  Blessed  Virgin,  the  An- 
gels, the  Saints,  the  souls  in  Paradise,  the  souls  in 
Purgatory,  the  demons,  and  the  damned,  all  these 
had  no  mystery.  I  knew  their  story,  everywhere  I 
encountered  faces  that  were  like  to  them.  The  Rue 
Saint-Sulpice  alone  provided  me  with  hundreds  of 
examples.  No,  the  world  which  excited  my  uncon- 
trollable curiosity,  the  world  of  my  dreams,  was  a 
world  unknown,  gloomy  and  silent,  the  mere  idea  of 
which  caused  me  to  feel  a  thrill  of  terror.  My  legs 
were,  in  all  conscience,  little  enough  to  carry  me 


106  LITTLE  PIERRE 

thither,  and  my  old  nurse  Melanie,  at  whose  skirt  I 
pulled  so  eagerly,  could  only  trot  along  pit-a-pat 
with  feeble  little  steps.  Albeit  I  did  not  lose  heart; 
I  clung  to  the  hope  that  one  day  I  should  cross  the 
confines  of  that  country  which  I  sought  with  longing 
and  with  awe.  Sometimes,  and  in  some  places,  it 
seemed  to  me  that  a  few  more  steps  would  bring  me 
to  the  land  of  my  desire.  To  pull  Melanie  along 
with  me,  I  had  recourse  to  stratagem  or  violence, 
and,  when  the  sainted  creature  was  for  turning 
home  again,  I  would  drag  her  furiously  toward  the 
mysterious  frontiers  at  the  risk  of  tearing  her  dress. 
And  as  she  could  make  nothing  of  my  divine  frenzy, 
wondering  what  was  amiss  with  my  heart  or  with 
my  mind,  she  would  raise  her  eyes  brimming  with 
tears  to  heaven.  Nevertheless,  I  could  not  tell  her 
why  I  acted  so;  I  could  not  cry  aloud,  "One  step 
more  and  we  shall  pass  within  the  nameless  realm." 
Alas,  how  many  times  since  then  have  I  been  com- 
pelled to  devour  within  me  the  secret  of  my  longing  I 
Assuredly,  I  drew  for  myself  no  mental  chart  of 
the  Unknown  Land.  I  knew  not  its  geography,  but 
I  thought  that  I  could  tell  some  places  where  that 
mysterious  world  impinged  upon  our  own,  and  those 
confines,  as  I  deemed,  were  not  far  removed  from 
the  places  where  I  lived  and  had  my  being.  I  know 
not  by  what  sign  I  recognized  them  unless  it  was  by 
a  certain  strangeness,  a  certain  disturbing  charm 
about  them,  and  a  feeling  of  curiosity  not  unmingled 


LITTLE  PIERRE  107 

with  fear  with  which  they  inspired  me.  One  of  these 
border  lines  which  I  had  never  been  able  to  pass  be- 
yond was  marked  by  two  houses  united  by  an  iron 
grille.  They  were  not  like  other  houses,  but  were 
built  of  great  stone  blocks,  heavy  looking,  and  melan- 
choly, and  girt  about  with  a  noble  frieze  of  female 
figures  standing  hand  in  hand  between  silent  es- 
cutcheons. And  there  in  truth,  if  not  the  gateway 
of  the  material  world,  was  situated,  at  all  events,  one 
of  those  barriers  of  Paris  erected  in  the  reign  of 
Louis  XVI  by  Ledoux,  the  architect,  to  wit,  the  Bar- 
riere  d'Enfer.* 

In  the  humid  regions  of  the  Tuileries,  not  far 
from  the  spot  where  the  marble  boar  sits  beneath 
the  shade  of  the  chestnut-trees,  beneath  the  terrace 
by  the  waterside,  there  is  a  cool  cavern  wherein  a 
white  woman  lies  sleeping,  a  serpent  coiled  about  her 
arm.  I  used  to  suspect  that  this  cavern  communi- 
cated with  the  Unknown  World,  but  that  to  descend 
therein  it  was  necessary  to  raise  a  heavy  stone. 

In  the  cellars  of  the  very  house  in  which  I  lived, 
there  was  a  door,  the  sight  of  which  thrilled  me  with 
fear  and  expectancy.  It  was  nearly  the  same  in 
appearance  as  the  doors  of  the  adjoining  cellars;  the 
lock  was  rusty,  the  woodlice  glistened  upon  the 
threshold  and  in  the  crevices  of  the  rotting  wood- 
work, but,  unlike  the  other  doors,  no  one  ever  came 

*  Place  d'Enfer,  by  a  wretched  pun,  in  the  manner  of  the  Marquis 
de  Bievre,  became  known  in  1879  as  Place  Denfert-Rochereau. 


io8  LITTLE  PIERRE 

to  open  it.  It  is  ever  thus  with  the  doors  of  mystery; 
they  are  never  unlocked.  And  then,  in  the  room 
where  I  used  to  sleep,  there  rose  up  from  the  crev- 
ices between  the  boards,  forms,  nay,  not  forms, 
shadows,  nay  not  even  shadows,  influences  rather, 
emanations,  which  overwhelmed  me  with  terror,  and 
could  not  but  come  from  that  world  that  was  so 
near  and  withal  so  inaccessible.  Perhaps  the  mean- 
ing of  what  I  am  saying  now  will  not  be  clear.  At 
the  moment  it  is  to  myself  alone  that  I  am  speaking, 
and  for  once  I  listen  to  what  I  have  to  say  with  in- 
terest, ay,  and  with  emotion. 

Despairing  sometimes  of  ever  discovering  the  Un- 
known World  for  myself,  I  longed  at  least  to  hear 
tell  about  it.  One  day,  when  Melanie  was  seated 
with  her  knitting  on  one  of  the  chairs  in  the  Luxem- 
bourg, I  asked  her  if  she  knew  anything  about  what 
existed  in  the  cave  where  the  white  woman  lay  asleep 
with  the  serpent  coiled  about  her  arm,  or  of  what 
was  behind  that  cellar  door  which  never,  never 
opened. 

She  seemed  not  to  understand  me. 

But  I  returned  to  the  charge: 

"And  the  two  houses  of  the  stone  woman,  what  is 
there  after  you  have  passed  them?" 

Getting  no  reply,  I  gave  another  turn  to  my  ques- 
tions : 

"Melanie,  tell  me  a  tale  of  the  Unknown  Land." 

Melanie  smiled. 


LITTLE  PIERRE  109 

"Mon  petit  monsieur,"  she  said.    "I  know  no  tale 

of  the  Unknown  Land." 

As  I  insisted  and  grew  importunate: 

"Mon  petit  monsieur,  I  will  sing  you  a  song." 

And  under  her  breath  she  hummed  so  softly  you 

could  hardly  hear  her: 

"Compere  Guilleri, 
Te  lairreras-tu  mouri'?" 

Alas,  Life,  that  Queen  of  Metamorphoses,  has  suf- 
fered me  to  remain  like  to  the  child  which  asked  his 
nurse  to  tell  him  the  things  that  no  man  knoweth  I  I 
have  dragged  a  long  chain  of  days  without  giving  up 
the  hope  of  finding  the  Unknown  Land. 

Whithersoever  I  have  wandered,  I  have  sought 
for  it.  Ah,  many  a  time  and  oft,  beside  the  silver 
waters  of  the  Gironde,  as  I  roamed  the  billowy  ocean 
of  the  vines  with  my  comrade,  my  friend,  the  little 
brown  dog  Mitzi,  many  a  time  and  oft,  have  I  trem- 
bled, at  a  turning  in  the  track,  as  I  came  upon  a  path- 
way unexplored.  Thou  hast  seen  me,  Mitzi,  scan- 
ning the  crossways,  every  corner  of  the  road,  every 
winding  of  the  woodland  track,  thinking  to  behold 
that  dread  apparition,  formless,  like  to  the  uncreate, 
which  would  have  for  a  moment  relieved  me  of  the 
burthen  of  the  mystery,  the  heavy  and  the  weary 
weight  of  life. 

And  thou,  my  friend,  my  brother,  wast  thou  not 
seeking  also  something  that  thou  didst  never  find? 
I  never  read  all  the  secrets  of  thy  soul,  but  I  read 


i  io  LITTLE  PIERRE 

therein  too  many  things  that  resembled  mine  not  to 
believe  that  thou,  too,  wast  restless  and  tormented. 
Even  as  mine,  thy  quest  was  vain.  Our  search  is 
bootless.  We  seek  and  only  find — ourselves.  For, 
to  every  one  of  us,  the  world  is  only  what  we  have 
within  us.  Poor  Mitzi,  thou  hadst  not,  as  had  I,  a 
brain  with  many  convolutions,  and  speech,  and  com- 
plex apparatus,  and  books  rich  with  the  spoils  of 
time  to  illumine  thy  path  withal.  The  light  of  thine 
eyes  is  extinguished,  and  the  world  with  it;  that 
world  whereof  thou  knewest  scarcely  anything.  Oh, 
if  thy  beloved  little  shade  could  but  hear  me  speak, 
I  would  say  to  it:  "A  little  while  and  my  eyes,  too, 
will  close  for  ever,  and  I  shall  have  learnt  but  little 
more  than  thou  concerning  the  mystery  of  Life  and 
Death.  As  for  that  Unknown  World  which  I  was 
seeking,  rightly  did  I  think  when  I  was  a  little  child 
that  it  was  close  at  hand.  The  Unknown  World  is 
all  about  us;  it  is  everything  that  is  outside  us.  And, 
since  we  can  never  escape  from  ourselves,  we  shall 
discover  it  never." 


CHAPTER  XV 

MONSIEUR  MENAGE 

NDER  the  personal  direction  of  the 
landlord,  M.  Bellaguet,  our  block 
of  flats  on  the  quay  was  respectable, 
quiet,  and,  as  the  saying  goes,  "well 
let."  Although  he  had  made  a  for- 
tune during  the  Restoration  and  the 
July  government,  M.  Bellaguet  looked  after  the  let- 
ting himself,  drew  up  the  leases,  managed  the  repairs 
with  parsimony,  and,  whenever  a  suite  of  rooms  fell 
to  be  redecorated,  a  thing  that  rarely  happened,  su- 
pervised the  work  in  person.  You  never  heard  of  a 
dozen  yards  of  wall-paper  at  fourpence  the  piece 
being  hung  anywhere  in  the  building,  without  the 
landlord's  being  there  to  see  it  done.  For  the  rest, 
he  was  kindly,  affable  and  anxious  to  oblige  his  ten- 
ants, provided  always  it  didn't  cost  him  money.  He 
dwelt  among  us  as  a  father  among  his  children,  and 
I  used  to  see  his  bright  blue  bedroom  curtains  from- 
my  window.  He  was  not  thought  any  the  less  of  for 
keeping  a  close  eye  on  his  property.  Possibly  peo- 
ple esteemed  him  the  more  for  it,  for  what  entitles 
wealthy  people  to  consideration  is  their  wealth. 

Their  stinginess,  by  making  them  richer,  increases 

in 


ii2  LITTLE  PIERRE 

the  estimation  in  which  they  are  held;  whereas,  if 
they  are  generous,  they  diminish  their  stock  of 
wealth,  and,  with  it,  their  credit  and  reputation. 

When  M.  Bellaguet  was  a  young  man,  at  the 
time  of  the  Revolution,  he  had  pursued  all  sorts  of 
avocations.  Like  his  King,  he  was  something  of  an 
apothecary.  In  urgent  cases  of  injury  or  suffocation, 
he  administered  first  aid  to  the  sufferers  who,  good 
folk,  were  duly  grateful  to  him  for  his  services.  You 
couldn't  see  a  finer  looking  old  man,  one  more  vener- 
able or  more  stately  in  his  bearing.  He  had  no 
"side."  Things  were  told  about  him  that  would  have 
done  credit  to  Napoleon.  One  night  he  had  opened 
the  front  door  himself  rather  than  disturb  his  porter. 
He  was  a  good  father;  his  two  daughters  testified, 
by  their  merry,  contented  looks,  to  the  kindness  of 
the  paternal  treatment.  In  short,  M.  Bellaguet  en- 
joyed the  unanimous  esteem  of  all  who  dwelt  within 
his  walls,  wherever  indeed  his  Turkish  cap  and  flow- 
ered dressing  gown  came  within  the  range  of  vision. 
The  rest  of  the  world  always  called  him  "That  old 
sharper,  Bellaguet." 

He  had  attained  to  that  bad  eminence  by  having 
been  mixed  up  in  some  case  of  swindling  and  corrup- 
tion which  involved  the  July  Government  in  the  thun- 
der and  lightning  of  a  first  class  scandal.  M.  Bel- 
laguet was  jealous  of  the  honour  of  his  establish- 
ment, and  only  "let"  to  tenants  of  unblemished  repu- 
tation. And  if  the  fair  Madame  Moser  was  the 


LITTLE  PIERRE  113 

only  one  of  them  not  quite  above  suspicion,  she  was 
at  least  vouched  for  by  an  ambassador  and  conducted 
herself  with  perfect  propriety.  But  the  house  was 
very  large,  and  divided  up  into  numerous  flats,  some 
of  which  were  small,  low,  and  dingy.  The  attics, 
which  were  more  numerous  than  was  necessary  for 
the  servants'  accommodation,  were  poky,  incon- 
venient and  draughty;  hot  in  summer  and  cold  in 
winter.  Very  sensibly  M.  Bellaguet  reserved  the 
small  flats,  garrets  and  attics  for  people  like  Mon- 
sieur and  Madame  Debas  and  Madame  Petit,  the 
spectacle-seller;  little  people  who  didn't  pay  much 
rent  but  paid  it  regularly  every  quarter. 

M.  Bellaguet  was  a  handy  man  and  had  himself 
fitted  up  a  little  studio  in  the  loft,  where  M.  Menage 
did  his  painting.  This  studio  was  just  opposite 
Melanie's  room,  from  which  it  was  separated  by  the 
width  of  a  narrow,  sticky,  grimy,  spider-haunted 
passage,  which  always  smelt  of  the  sink.  The  stairs 
ended  there,  and  were  very  steep  at  the  top.  Right 
in  front  of  you  as  you  came  up  was  the  door  of 
Melanie's  room.  It  was  heavily  wainscoted  and  lit 
by  a  skylight  of  greenish  glass  which  had  been  broken 
in  several  places  and  was  patched  up  with  paper.  The 
glass  was  thick  with  dust  and  begrimed  the  face  of 
the  heavens.  Melanie's  bed  was  covered  with  a 
coloured  quilt  ornamented  with  an  oft-repeated  de- 
sign, printed  in  red,  representing  a  young  girl  receiv- 
ing a  prize  for  good  conduct.  That,  with  a  walnut 


ii4  LITTLE  PIERRE 

chest  of  drawers,  made  up  the  total  of  my  dear 
nanny's  worldly  belongings.  Opposite  her  room  was 
the  door  of  the  artist's  studio.  A  visiting  card  with 
M.  Menage's  name  on  it  was  nailed  to  the  door. 
On  the  right,  facing  the  door,  in  the  dingy  light  that 
trickled  through  a  skylight  covered  with  cobwebs, 
you  could  see  a  sink  with  its  waste  pipe,  whence  there 
proceeded  an  everlasting  smell  of  greens.  At  this 
end  of  the  passage,  facing  the  quay,  it  was  only  about 
ten  paces  or  so  up  to  the  skylight.  At  the  other 
extremity  the  only  light  was  a  faint  glimmer  that 
came  up  the  staircase.  The  passage  disappeared  in 
the  gloom  and  seemed  to  me  to  be  endless.  My 
imagination  peopled  it  with  monsters. 

Sometimes  my  good  Melanie,  when  she  went  to 
put  her  linen  away  in  her  chest  of  drawers,  permitted 
me  to  accompany  her.  But  I  was  not  allowed  on  the 
top  floor  alone,  and  I  was  expressly  forbidden  to 
enter  the  painter's  studio,  or  even  to  go  near  it.  Ac- 
cording to  Melanie,  I  should  not  have  been  able  to 
bear  the  sight  of  it.  She  herself  had  been  scared 
out  of  her  wits  to  see  a  skeleton  hanging  there  and 
human  limbs  pale  as  death  stuck  up  along  the  walls. 
This  description  aw»ke  fear  and  curiosity  within  me, 
and  I  was  burning  with  desire  to  gain  entrance  to  the 
studio  of  M.  Menage.  One  day  I  had  gone  up  with 
my  old  nurse  to  her  attic  where  she  began  to  fold  up 
numberless  old  pairs  of  stockings  and  I  deemed  that 
the  favourable  moment  had  arrived.  I  slipped  out 


LITTLE  PIERRE  115 

of  the  room  and  quietly  covered  the  two  paces  that 
divided  me  from  the  studio.  I  could  see  daylight 
through  the  keyhole  and  was  just  going  to  put  my 
eye  to  it  when,  terror-stricken  at  the  horrible  noise 
the  rats  were  making  overhead,  I  started  back  and 
hurriedly  retreated  into  Melanie's  room.  This  did 
not  prevent  my  telling  her  all  the  things  I  had  seen 
through  the  keyhole. 

"I  saw,"  I  said,  "human  limbs  as  pale  as  death. 
Thfire  were  millions  of  them — it  was  frightful.  I 
saw  skeletons  dancing  round  in  a  circle,  and  a  mon- 
key blowing  a  trumpet — it  was  frightful.  I  saw 
seven  women.  They  were  very  beautiful  and  wore 
dresses  of  gold  and  silver,  and  cloaks  the  same  colour 
as  the  sun  and  the  moon  and  the  weather.  They 
were  hanging  with  their  throats  cut,  all  along  the 
wall,  and  their  blood  was  flowing  in  torrents  over 
the  white  marble  floor." 

I  was  thinking  what  else  to  say  I  had  seen,  when 
Melanie  asked  me,  ironically,  if  I  had  really  seen  all 
those  things  in  so  short  a  time.  I  expunged  the 
ladies  and  the  skeletons  from  the  indictment;  possi- 
bly I  had  not  seen  them  very  plainly.  But  I  stuck 
to  it  that  I  had  seen  "the  human  limbs  as  pale  as 
death."  And  perhaps  I  really  believed  I  had. 


CHAPTER  XVI 

SHE  LAID  HER  HAND  ON  MY  HEAD 


MORIN  had  a  full-blown  face 
and  big  lips,  which,  curving  up- 
wards at  each  corner,  joined  com- 
pany with  a  pair  of  pepper  and 
salt  whiskers.  His  eyes,  his  nose, 
his  mouth,  all  his  broad,  open 
countenance  seemed,  literally,  to  breathe  frankness. 
He  was  simple  in  his  dress,  meticulously  clean,  and 
smelt  of  primrose  soap.  M.  Morin  was  neither 
young  nor  old,  and,  if  he  was  in  the  position  of  the 
man  in  the  story  whose  two  lady  admirers  wished  to 
make  him  match  their  respective  ages,  it  was  cer- 
tainly Madame  Morin,  his  wife,  who  pulled  out  his 
dark  hairs,  for  she  seemed  older  than  he.  Her  man- 
ners also  were  superior,  and  she  bore  herself  with 
much  elegance  for  a  woman  of  her  station.  But  I 
did  not  like  her  because  she  was  sad. 

Madame  Morin  was  concierge  at  a  house  near 
ours,  which  also  belonged  to  M.  Bellaguet,  and  she 
performed  the  duties  of  the  porter's  lodge  with  an 
air  of  melancholy  distinction.  Her  pale,  withered 
features  might  well  have  belonged  to  the  daughter 

of  some  illustrious  but  ill-fated  line,  and  my  mother 

116 


LITTLE  PIERRE  117 

used  to  say  she  was  like  Queen  Marie  Amelie.  M. 
Morin  also  did  his  share  of  work  in  the  porter's  box; 
but  that  he  looked  on  as  the  least  of  his  duties.  Two 
other  important  employments  occupied  the  bulk  of 
his  time  and  energies:  he  was  M.  Bellaguet's  facto- 
tum, and  an  employe  at  the  Chamber  of  Deputies. 
My  father  held  him  in  such  high  esteem  that  he  left 
me  in  his  company  whole  mornings  together.  M. 
Morin  was  much  respected.  Everybody  in  the  dis- 
trict knew  him,  and  he  had  his  niche  in  history  be- 
cause he  had  carried  the  Comte  de  Paris  in  his  arms 
on  the  24th.  February,  1848. 

It  will  be  remembered  that,  after  Louis  Philippe 
had  abdicated  in  favour  of  his  grandson,  and  the 
Royal  Family  had  taken  to  flight,  the  Duchesse 
d'Orleans,  quitting  the  palace  now  invaded  by  the 
populace,  proceeded  in  the  company  of  her  two  chil- 
dren, the  Comte  de  Paris  and  the  Due  de  Chartres, 
both  of  tender  age,  and  a  few  loyal  servitors,  to  the 
Chamber  of  Deputies,  where  she  caused  herself  to 
be  announced  as  mother  of  the  new  King,  and  Queen 
Regent  of  the  Realm.  Simultaneously  with  her  en- 
try, a  group  of  Republicans  burst  tumultuously  into 
the  Chamber.  Erect  at  the  foot  of  the  tribune, 
clasping  her  two  children  by  the  hand,  she  waited 
for  the  Assembly  to  ratify  her  appointment.  The 
applause  that  had  greeted  her  entry  swiftly  died 
away.  The  majority  were  not  in  favour  of  a  re- 
gency. Sauzet,  the  President,  called  on  all  non- 


u8  LITTLE  PIERRE 

members  to  withdraw  from  the  Chamber.  With 
slow  and  measured  steps  the  princess  made  her  way 
from  the  hemicycle,  but,  actuated  either  by  ambition 
or  a  mother's  love,  she  resolved  to  uphold  her  sons' 
rights,  and,  reckless  of  the  perils  that  encompassed 
her,  refused  to  leave  the  Hall.  Ascending  by  the 
central  stairway  to  the  top  of  the  amphitheatre,  she 
there  unfolded  a  paper  and  essayed  to  address  the 
assembly.  This  little  woman,  so  pale  in  her  flowing 
widow's  weeds,  had  a  power  over  individual  hearts, 
but  it  was  not  given  her  to  move  and  to  sway  multi- 
tudes. Her  voice  was  inaudible;  you  could  scarcely 
see  her  amid  the  shouting  groups  that  surged  around 
her.  Suddenly  the  dull  murmur  without  grew  louder 
and  nearer.  The  doors  were  battered  down  with 
the  butt  end  of  rifles,  and  working  men,  students, 
and  National  Guards  came  pouring  into  the  hemi- 
cycle shouting: 

"Down  with  the  Bourbons!  Down  with  the 
King!  The  Republic  for  ever!" 

Shots  were  fired  off  in  the  corridors.  But,  above 
the  shouting  and  the  noise  of  firearms,  there  fell 
upon  the  ear  a  sound,  distant,  confused,  and  faint  as 
yet,  but  more  terrible  than  all — the  billows  of  the 
human  ocean  beating  against  the  Palace  walls.  Soon 
another  wave  of  men  came  flooding  in,  surging  this 
time  round  the  public  tribune,  and  overwhelming  the 
assembly.  Bands  of  ruffians  armed  with  pikes,  cut- 
lasses and  pistols,  incited  each  other  to  slaughter. 


LITTLE  PIERRE  119 

Lamartine  was  in  the  tribune,  and  was  suspected 
(quite  wrongly)  of  speaking  in  favour  of  a  regency. 
Rifles  and  blood-stained  swords  were  pointed  in  his 
direction.  The  panic  stricken  deputies  made  a  rush 
for  the  doors.  The  Duchesse  d'Orleans  was  borne 
along  with  her  children  by  the  avalanche  of  fugi- 
tives, pushed  towards  the  little  door  that  opens  on 
the  left  of  the  office,  and  swept  out  into  the  narrow 
passage,  where,  trampled  upon  and  nearly  suffocated 
between  the  deputies  who  were  trying  to  get  out  and 
the  mob  who  were  trying  to  get  in,  crushed  against 
the  wall,  and  separated  from  her  children,  she  fell 
half  fainting  at  the  foot  of  the  staircase.  It  hap- 
pened that  Morin  was  just  then  in  the  passage  and, 
hearing  a  child  crying,  he  looked  about  him  and 
caught  sight  of  the  little  Comte  de  Paris,  who  had 
been  knocked  down  and  was  being  trampled  under 
foot.  He  raised  him  in  his  arms,  carried  him 
through  the  salons  and  vestibule,  and,  passing  him 
through  a  little  window  that  opened  on  to  the  gar- 
den, handed  him  over  to  an  artillery  officer  who  was 
looking  for  his  royal  charges. 

Meanwhile,  the  Duchess,  who  had  taken  refuge 
in  one  of  the  Presidential  salons,  was  calling  loudly 
for  her  children.  They  brought  her  the  Comte  de 
Paris,  and  told  her  that  the  Due  de  Chartres  was 
safe  and  sound,  disguised  as  a  girl,  in  one  of  the 
Palace  attics. 

Such  was  M.  Morin's  story.     He  related  it  fre- 


120  LITTLE  PIERRE 

quently  and  always  wound  up  with  the  following 
reflection : 

"All  through  this  trying  time  the  Duchesse 
d'Orleans  displayed  extraordinary  courage,  and  such 
powers  of  resistance  as  few  men  would  have  been 
capable  of.  If  only  she  had  been  eighteen  inches 
taller  her  son  would  have  been  king.  But  she  was 
too  small.  You  couldn't  see  her  in  such  a  crowd." 

The  most  convincing  evidence  of  the  high  esteem 
in  which  M.  Morin  and  his  wife  were  held  by  my 
parents  was  the  fact  that  they  allowed  me  to  be  with 
them  as  much  as  I  liked,  although  they  were  very 
particular  concerning  the  people  with  whom  I  asso- 
ciated. Their  strictness  in  these  matters  was  a  worry 
to  me.  On  the  floor  above  us,  for  example,  there 
lived  a  certain  Madame  Moser,  concerning  whom  a 
good  deal  of  whispering  went  on.  She  used  to  spend 
long,  idle  days  alone  in  her  rooms,  which  were  fur- 
nished in  Oriental  style;  she  wore  a  pink  dressing- 
gown,  slippers  of  pale  blue  and  gold,  and  she  was 
daintily  perfumed.  Every  time  an  opportunity  of- 
fered, she  carried  me  off  to  her  rooms  to  amuse  her. 
Stretched  languorously  on  the  sofa,  she  would  take 
me  playfully  in  her  arms.  I  was  just  going  to  relate, 
in  quite  good  faith,  that  she  hoisted  me  up  in  the  air 
on  the  sole  of  her  foot,  like  a  toy  dog,  but  I  remem- 
bered, just  in  time,  that  I  wasn't  pretty  enough  for 
that,  and  I  probably  got  the  notion  from  Fragonard's 
Gimblette,  which  I  saw  for  the  first  time  when 


LITTLE  PIERRE  121 

Madame  Moser's  pretty  feet  had  for  many  a  year 
been  resting  in  the  eternal  shades;  but  memories  of 
divers  times  have  a  habit  of  changing  places  in  the 
mind,  of  dissolving  one  into  another  and  forming 
themselves  into  a  single  picture.  That  is  what  I  am 
Afraid  of  in  these  tales  of  mine,  which  if  they  have 
not  the  merjt  of  truthfulness  have  no  merit  at  all. 
Madame  Moser  gave  me  sweets,  told  me  stories 
about  brigands,  and  sang  me  love  songs.  Unhappily 
for  me,  my  parents  forbade  me  to  respond  to  the 
advances  of  this  lady,  and  threatened  me  with  their 
direst  displeasure  if  ever  I  crossed  the  threshold  of 
those  Oriental  rooms  with  their  alluring  colours  and 
insinuating  odours.  I  was  also  forbidden  to  venture 
up  into  the  attics  into  M.  Menage's  studio.  Me- 
lanie  announced  as  a  reason  for  this  that  M.  Menage 
was  in  the  habit  of  suspending  livid  pieces  of  the 
human  body  and  skeletons,  in  his  studio.  But  those 
were  by  no  means  the  only  complaints  she  had  to  lay 
against  her  neighbour,  the  painter.  She  informed 
M.  Danquin  one  day  that  that  horrible  creature, 
Menage,  prevented  her  sleeping  by  singing  and  play- 
ing all  night  long  with  his  friends,  so  that  it  was  like 
Bedlam  let  loose,  and  my  godfather  told  the  dear 
simple  creature,  whom  he  was  not  ashamed  to  make 
fun  of,  that  these  artistic  people  not  only  sing  and 
dance  the  livelong  night,  but  that  they  quaff  blazing 
punch  from  dead  men's  skulls.  Melanie  was  much 
too  proper  a  person  to  doubt  my  godfather's  word; 


122  LITTLE  PIERRE 

moreover,  the  painter  blackened  his  reputation  in  the 
eyes  of  this  highly  respectable  old  servant  by  a  deed 
more  horrible  still.  One  night,  when  she  went  up  to 
her  attic,  candle  in  hand,  Melanie  saw  on  the  door 
of  her  room  a  little  Cupid  sketched  in  chalk;  his  bow 
and  his  quiver  were  suspended  between  his  wings, 
and  with  a  suppliant  air  he  was  beating  at  the  closed 
door  with  his  little  fist.  Strongly  suspecting  that  M. 
Menage  was  responsible  for  this  compromising  pic- 
ture, she  called  him  a  rogue  and  a  scoundrel,  and 
once  more  repeated  her  injunction  that  I  was  to 
have  nothing  whatever  to  do  with  so  ill-bred  a 
ruffian. 

Few,  in  fact,  were  the  people  who  were  deemed 
worthy  of  close  acquaintanceship  with  me.  I  was 
not  allowed  to  play  in  the  courtyard  with  the  child 
of  M.  Bellaguet's  cook,  young  Alphonse,  who  was 
bold,  and  skilled  in  cunning  tricks,  for  his  manners 
were  bad  and  he  said  coarse  things,  made  long  noses 
at  people,  and  ran  the  streets.  One  day  Alphonse 
took  me  to  a  baker's  in  the  Rue  Dauphine,  where 
they  sold  trimmings  from  sacramental  wafers,  of 
which  he  ordered  a  pennyworth,  and  for  which  I 
paid,  being  the  rich  one  of  the  party.  We  divided 
it  into  two  portions,  which  we  carried  away  in  our 
pinafores.  Alphonse,  however,  ate  the  whole  lot  as 
we  were  going  along.  This  escapade  got  me  into  a 
serious  scrape,  and  I  was  compelled  to  break  with 
Alphonse.  Nor  was  I  permitted  to  associate  with 


LITTLE  PIERRE  123 

Honore  Dumont.  Honore,  whose  father  was  a 
High  Court  Judge,  was  of  good  family,  and  fair  as 
day,  but  he  was  cruel  td  animals  and  endowed  with 
perverted  instincts.  I  was,  however,  given  full  leave 
to  enjoy  the  company  of  Monsieur  and  Madame 
Morin. 

I  availed  myself  but  sparingly  of  this  permission 
with  regard  to  Madame  Morin;  for,  wearing  an 
elaborate  white  head-dress,  after  the  manner  of 
Queen  Marie  Amelie,  her  long  dismal  face  yellower 
than  an  orange,  she  radiated  an  atmosphere  of  mel- 
ancholy and  desolation.  Even  so,  if  only  Madame 
Morin  had  inspired  those  who  approached  her  with 
a  vast  and  fathomless  sadness,  a  splendid  desolation, 
a  sense  of  some  abysmal  calamity,  I  should  have, 
perhaps,  been  conscious  of  that  sort  of  pleasure 
which  I  experienced  from  anything  excessive,  mon- 
strous, or  out  of  the  common  order,  but  the  melan- 
choly of  Madame  Morin  was  regular,  moderate, 
monotonous,  and  hum-drum;  it  soaked  into  me  like 
fine  rain,  and  made  me  feel  quite  numb.  Madame 
Morin  rarely  quitted  her  lodge,  which  had  been  fitted 
up  at  the  side  of  the  carriage  entrance.  It  was  nar- 
row, low  and  damp,  and  the  only  thing  about  it 
worthy  of  note  was  the  bed,  which  was  so  lavishly 
furnished  with  palliasses,  mattresses,  blankets,  coun- 
terpanes, bolsters,  pillows,  and  eiderdowns,  that  it 
seemed  to  me  incredible  that  anyone  could  sleep  in  it 
without  being  suffocated.  I  suppose  that  Monsieur 


124  LITTLE  PIERRE 

and  Madame  Morin,  who  used  to  sleep  in  it  every 
night,  owed  their  miraculous  preservation  to  the 
sprig  of  boxwood  which,  stuck  under  the  cross  of  a 
china  holy  water  stoup,  surmounted  the  couch  of 
death. 

A  wreath  of  orange  blossom  under  a  glass  globe 
adorned  the  walnut  chest  of  drawers.  On  the  black 
marble  chimney-piece,  a  clock,  also  covered  with  a 
glass  globe,  half  Gothic  and  half  Turkish  in  style, 
served  as  a  stand  for  a  gilt  group  representing,  as 
Madame  Morin  informed  me,  "Mathilde  plighting 
her  troth  to  Malek-Adhel  amid  the  storm  in  the 
desert."  I  inquired  no  further,  not  that  I  was  not 
an  inquisitive  and  curious  little  boy,  but  because  the 
story,  thus  incomplete,  charmed  me  by  reason  of  its 
mystery;  and  the  names  of  Malek-Adhel  and  Ma- 
thilde remain  associated  in  my  memory  with  the 
smell  of  boiled  leeks,  braised  onions,  and  soot  that 
clung  about  Madame  Morin's  lodge.  That  worthy 
person,  wearing  her  habitual  air  of  melancholy,  used 
to  do  her  cooking  in  an  oven  that  was  very  low.  The 
flue  pipe  was  fitted  into  the  chimney,  and  was  for 
ever  smoking.  The  liveliest  amusement  I  found  in 
her  company  was  to  watch  her  skimming  the  soup 
and  peeling  carrots.  The  great  care  she  took  to 
remove  as  little  as  possible  revealed  a  parsimonious 
mind.  On  the  other  hand,  M.  Morin's  occupations 
entertained  me  greatly. 

When,  armed  with  carpet  brushes,  feather  mops 


LITTLE  PIERRE  125 

and  brooms,  he  prepared  to  introduce  into  a  room 
the  order  and  neatness  that  were  dear  to  him,  he 
laughed  a  merry  laugh,  and  opened  his  mouth  from 
ear  to  ear.  His  big  round  eyes  lit  up,  his  broad 
features  beamed.  There  was  something  of  the  heroic 
about  him  that  seemed  to  suggest  Hercules  going 
about  his  domestic  labours  in  Elis.  If  I  had  the  good 
fortune  to  come  upon  him  at  such  a  moment  in  his 
day's  work,  I  would  hang  on  to  his  rough  hairy  hand 
all  smelling  of  yellow  soap,  and  we  would  go  up  the 
stairs  together  and  enter  one  of  the  suites  of  apart- 
ments entrusted  to  his  care  during  the  absence  of  the 
owners  and  their  servants.  Two  of  them  I  remem- 
ber well. 

I  can  still  see  in  my  mind's  eye  the  spacious  salon 
of  the  Comtesse  Michaud,  with  its  mirrors  and  all 
their  phantoms,  its  furniture  shrouded  in  white 
covers,  and  the  portrait  of  a  general  erect  in  full 
dress  uniform  amid  a  whirlwind  of  smoke  and  grape- 
shot.  Morin  informed  me  that  the  picture  repre- 
sented General  Comte  Michaud,  at  Wagram,  with 
all  his  decorations.  The  third  floor  was  more  to 
my  taste.  It  was  the  pied-a-terre  of  Comte  Colonna 
Walewski.  A  thousand  and  one  strange  and  charm- 
ing things  were  to  be  seen  there.  Chinese  figures, 
silken  screens,  folding  screens  in  lacquer,  narghiles, 
Turkish  pipes,  suits  of  armour,  ostrich  eggs,  guitars, 
Spanish  fans,  portraits  of  women,  luxurious  divans 
and  heavy  curtains.  When  I  expressed  the  wonder 


ia6  LITTLE  PIERRE 

I  felt  in  the  presence  of  all  these  strange  objects, 
Morin,  with  a  touch  of  pride  in  his  manner,  would 
remark  that  the  Comte  Walewski  was  a  dashing 
blade.  He  had  been  living  for  a  time  in  England, 
and  was  now  passing  through  Paris  on  his  way  to 
Italy,  where  he  had  been  appointed  ambassador.  I 
got  to  know  the  world  when  I  was  with  Morin. 

It  happened  that  one  day,  as  I  was  mounting  with 
him  up  the  rather  narrow  staircase  that  led  to  the 
apartments  of  the  Comtesse  Michaud,  the  Comte 

Walewski  and  some  other  tenants  whose  names  I 

i 

forget,  (the  outside  of  the  house,  which  I  often  look 
at,  has  not  changed;  what  reason  unknown  to  myself, 
what  secret  instinct  has  kept  me  from  going  to  see 
whether  the  staircase  is  still  the  same  as  it  was  when 
I  was  a  child?)  one  day,  I  say,  finding  myself  with 
Morin  between  the  first  and  second  landing,  we 
looked  up  and  saw  a  young  lady  coming  down  the 
stairs.  Forthwith  Morin,  who  was  the  last  Word  in 
politeness  and  who  always  instructed  me,  as  occa- 
sion demanded,  how  to  behave  like  a  nice  little  boy, 
made  me  stand  up  with  him  close  to  the  wall,  told 
me  to  hold  my  cap  in  my  hand,  and  doffed  his  own. 
The  young  lady  was  wearing  a  velvet  gown  and  a 
cashmere  shawl  with  a  big  palm-leaf  pattern.  Her 
dainty,  pale  face  was  encased  in  a  coal-scuttle  bonnet. 
She  descended  the  stairs  with  graceful  air.  As  she 
passed  us,  she  lowered  her  dark  bright  eyes  upon 


LITTLE  PIERRE  127 

me,  and  from  her  little  mouth,  her  tiny  little  mouth 
like  to  a  pomegranate,  there  stole  a  grave  soft  voice, 
the  like  of  which  for  richness  and  expression  I  have 
never  heard  in  another. 

"Morin,"  she  said,  "is  this  your  little  boy?  He 
is  a  nice  little  fellow."  And  she  laid  her  white-gloved 
hand  on  my  head. 

Morin  having  informed  her  that  I  belonged  to 
one  of  the  neighbours,  she  went  on : 

"Yes,  he's  a  nice  little  boy;  but  his  parents  ought 
to  be  careful.  He  looks  very  delicate,  and  his  cheeks 
are  flushed." 

Those  eyes,  which  looked  on  me  so  gently,  lit  up 
on  the  stage  with  the  "dark  flame"  wherewith  Phe- 
dra  was  consumed.  That  slender  hand,  laid  affec- 
tionately on  my  head,  used  to  thrill  the  audience  as  it 
gave  the  signal  for  the  murder  of  Pyrrhus.  Rachel, 
already  stricken  with  the  disease  which  was  to  bring 
her  to  the  grave,  was  seeking  out  the  signs  of  it  upon 
the  face  of  a  poor  little  boy  whom  she  chanced  to 
encounter  on  the  staircase  with  the  porter.  I  was 
not  old  enough  to  go  to  the  theatre  until  she  had 
given  up  the  stage,  and  I  never  saw  her  perform,  but 
I  can  still  feel  her  little  gloved  hand  on  my  head. 


CHAPTER  XVII 

BROTHER  IS  A  FRIEND  BESTOWED  ON  US  BY 
NATURE" 

Aunt  Chausson  lived  at  Angers. 
She  had  been  born  and  married 
there.  Having  been  left  a  widow, 
she  eked  out  her  slender  means  with 
the  strictest  regard  to  economy  and 
used  to  make  a  little  sparkling  wine, 
of  whicn  sne  was  very  proud  and  very  niggardly. 
Whenever  she  came  to  Paris,  which  was  looked  upon 
as  a  long  journey  in  those  days,  she  stayed  with  my 
parents.  The  announcement  of  her  coming  used  to 
be  received  without  enthusiasm  by  my  mother,  and 
also  by  old  Melanie,  who  was  afraid  of  her  stingy, 
provincial  ways. 

"It's  a  funny  thing,"  my  father  used  to  say,  "but 
my  sister  Renee,  although  she  was  married  for  eight 
years  before  she  lost  her  husband,  exhibits  the  type 
of  old  maidishness  in  all  its  baleful  perfection." 

My  Aunt  Chausson,  who  was  much  older  than  her 
brother,  thin,  and  parchment-skinned,  her  clothes 
skimpy  and  out  of  date,  appeared  a  great  deal  older 
than  she  really  was,  and  I  looked  on  her  as  bowed 

down  with  years  without  respecting  her  any  the  more 

128 


LITTLE  PIERRE  129 

for  that.  That  is  a  confession  that  costs  me  but  little. 
Respect  for  old  age  does  not  come  naturally  to  chil- 
dren: it  is  the  result  of  education  and  never  takes 
a  deep  hold  on  them.  I  did  not  love  my  Aunt  Chaus- 
son,  but,  having  no  desire  to  love  her,  I  felt  quite 
at  my  ease  in  her  company.  Her  arrival  caused 
me  the  greatest  joy  because  it  necessitated  changes 
in  the  house,  and  I  delighted  in  any  kind  of  change. 
My  bed  was  wheeled  into  the  little  rose-flowered 
sitting-room,  and  I  was  in  the  seventh  heaven. 

The  third  time  she  came  to  stay  with  us  after  I 
was  born,  she  examined  me  with  greater  attention 
than  on  any  previous  occasion,  and  the  examination 
was  not  favourable.  She  discovered  defects  that 
were  both  numerous  and  contradictory:  an  importu- 
nate turbulence  which  she  blamed  my  mother  for  not 
sternly  correcting,  a  quickness  unnatural  to  my  age, 
which  in  her  view  boded  nothing  good.  I  was  in- 
curably lazy,  immoderately  restless,  dull  and  back- 
ward, far  too  precocious.  To  these  various  and  un- 
favourable qualities,  she  assigned  a  common  origin. 
According  to  my  aunt,  the  whole  evil  (and  it  was  a 
big  one)  arose  from  the  fact  that  I  was  an  only  boy. 

When  my  mother  was  worried  because  I  was  pale 
and  languid,  my  aunt  would  say: 

"How  can  you  expect  him  to  be  bright  and  healthy 
when  he  has-no  child  to  play  with,  no  little  brother?" 

If  I  didn't  know  my  multiplication  table,  if  I  up- 
set the  ink  down  my  velvet  tunic,  if  I  ate  too  many 


130  LITTLE  PIERRE 

biscuits  or  dried  apples,  if  I  obstinately  refused  to  re- 
cite "The  Beasts  that  died  of  the  Plague"  to 
Madame  Caumont,  if  I  fell  down  and  raised  a  bump 
on  my  forehead,  if  Sultan  Mahmud  scratched  me, 
if  I  wept  over  my  canary  which  was  found  one  day 
motionless  in  its  cage,  with  its  eyes  closed  and  its 
feet  in  the  air,  if  the  rain  came  down  or  the  wind 
howled,  it  was  all  because  I  hadn't  a  brother.  One 
evening  at  the  dinner  table  I  took  it  into  my  head 
to  put  a  pinch  of  pepper  on  a  piece  of  cream  tart 
that  was  being  reserved  for  Melanie,  who  delighted 
in  sweet  things.  My  mother  caught  me  in  the  act 
and  reproached  me  for  an  action  which  she  did  not 
consider  a  credit  either  to  my  intelligence  or  to  my 
feelings.  My  Aunt  Chausson,  who  dotted  the  i's  and 
crossed  the  t's  of  this  verdict,  and  read  in  this  act  of 
mischief  the  symptoms  of  a  deep-seated  depravity, 
excused  me  on  the  ground  that  I  had  no  brother  or 
sister. 

"He  lives  alone.  Solitude  is  not  a  good  thing.  It 
develops  the  perverse  instincts,  the  seeds  of  which 
are  already  in  the  child.  He  is  unbearable.  Not 
only  does  he  try  to  put  poison  in  this  old  servant's 
pudding,  but  he  blows  down  the  back  of  my  neck, 
and  hides  my  spectacles.  If  I  lived  here  long,  An- 
toinette my  dear,  the  boy  would  drive  me  crazy." 

As  I  felt  perfectly  innocent  of  trying  to  poison 
anybody,  and  I  should  not  have  had  the  least  com- 
punction in  driving  Aunt  Chausson  crazy,  I  was  not 


LITTLE  PIERRE  131 

much  affected  by  her  accusations.  So  far  from  tak- 
ing what  the  old  lady  said  for  gospel  I  was  much  in- 
clined to  go  counter  to  her  opinions,  and  if  she  said 
she  wished  I  had  a  brother  or  a  sister  it  was  quite 
enough  for  me  to  hope  that  I  should  never  have 
either  one  or  the  other.  Moreover,  I  got  on  quite 
well  without  a  playmate.  I  may  not  have  found  the 
time  pass  so  quickly  as  it  does  to-day,  but  I  never 
found  it  heavy  on  my  hands,  because,  even  then,  my 
inner  life  was  very  active,  I  felt  and  pondered  things 
deeply  and  absorbed  everything  in  the  external  world 
which  I  could  take  in  with  my  childish  intelligence. 
Furthermore,  I  knew  that  little  brothers,  when  they 
come,  are  usually  quite  tiny,  knowing  not  how  to 
walk,  incapable  of  conversation  and  offering  no  sort 
of  usefulness.  There  was  no  certainty  that,  when 
mine  was  grown  big,  I  should  love  him  or  be  loved 
by  him.  The  august  and  familiar  example  of  Cain 
and  Abel  did  not  tend  to  reassure  me. 

It  is  true  that  from  my  windows  I  used  to  see 
the  twin  pumpkins,  Alfred  and  Clement  Caumont, 
slumbering  side  by  side  in  a  sort  of  deep  vegetable 
peace.  But  then  I  often  saw  Jean,  the  bricklayer's 
apprentice,  punching  into  his  brother  Alphonse  like 
so  much  mortar,  while  Alphonse  replied  by  putting 
out  his  tongue  and  making  long  noses  at  him. 

So  that  it  seemed  to  me  rather  a  difficult  thing  to 
base  one's  views  on  any  authoritative  example.  And, 
in  point  of  fact,  being  an  only  child  presented,  in 


132  LITTLE  PIERRE 

my  opinion,  distinct  advantages,  among  others  those 
of  never  being  thwarted,  of  not  being  obliged  to 
share  my  parents'  love  with  others,  and  of  safeguard- 
ing that  taste,  that  necessity,  for  communing  with 
myself  which  I  had  always  experienced  from  my 
earliest  childhood.  At  the  same  time  I  wanted  to 
have  a  little  brother  so  that  I  could  love  him;  for 
my  mind  was  full  of  uncertainties  and  contradictions. 
One  day  I  asked  my  dear  mamma  to  tell  me  in  con- 
fidence whether  she  didn't  think  she  would  give  me  a 
little  brother.  Laughingly  she  said  "No,"  adding 
that  she  was  too  much  afraid  he  might  turn  out  to  be 
another  naughty  little  boy  like  me.  This  did  not 
seem  to  me  to  be  taking  the  matter  seriously.  My 
Aunt  Chausson  went  back  to  Angers,  and  I  thought 
no  more  about  the  subject  that  had  occupied  my  mind 
so  deeply  during  her  stay  with  us.  But  some  days 
after  her  departure,  some  days  or  some  months  (for 
what  gives  me  the  greatest  trouble  in  these  narra- 
tives, is  the  matter  of  chronology)  my  godfather,  M. 
Danquin  came  one  morning  to  have  lunch  with  us.  It 
was  a  brilliant  day.  The  sparrows  were  twittering 
on  the  housetops.  Suddenly  I  was  seized  with  an  ir- 
resistible desire  to  do  something  out  of  the  ordinary, 
something  that  should,  if  possible,  partake  of  the 
nature  of  the  miraculous,  in  order  to  vary  the  mo- 
notony of  things.  The  means  at  my  disposal  for  the 
arrangement  and  execution  of  such  an  enterprise 
were  very  meagre.  Having  an  idea  that  I  might  find 


LITTLE  PIERRE  133 

something  to  my  hand  in  the  kitchen,  I  entered  and 
found  it  glowing,  fragrant  and  untenanted.  Just  as 
she  was  going  to  dish  up,  Melanie,  in  her  usual  fash- 
ion, had  gone  off  to  the  grocer's  or  the  fruiterer's  for 
some  herb  or  grain  or  condiment  she  had  forgotten. 
On  the  stove  stood  a  sizzling  casserole  of  jugged 
hare.  At  the  sight  of  it,  I  was  seized  with  a  sudden 
inspiration.  In  obedience  to  its  dictates,  I  took  the 
jugged  hare  off  the  fire  and  went  and  hid  it  in  the 
cupboard  where  the  brooms  were  kept.  This  move 
was  successfully  carried  out  save  that  four  fingers  of 
my  right  hand  and  both  my  knees  were  burnt,  my 
face  scorched,  my  pinafore,  my  stockings,  and  my 
shoes  entirely  spoilt,  and  that  three  parts  of  the 
sauce,  with  some  pieces  of  bacon  and  a  lot  of  little 
onions,  were  upset  all  over  the  floor.  Incontinent  I 
rushed  away  to  fetch  the  Noah's  Ark  I  had  had  given 
me  for  Christmas,  and  poured  all  the  animals  it  con- 
tained into  a  magnificent  copper  saucepan  which  I 
put  on  the  stove  in  place  of  the  hare.  This  fricas« 
see  very  pleasantly  recalled  to  my  mind  what  I  had 
learnt,  from  hearsay  and  from  picture  books,  of  the 
feast  of  Gargantua.  For,  if  the  giant  spitted  with 
his  two  pronged  fork  whole  oxen  at  a  time,  here 
was  I  compounding  a  dish  of  all  the  animals  in  crea- 
tion, from  the  elephant  and  the  giraffe  down  to  the 
butterfly  and  the  grasshopper.  I  revelled  in  anticipa- 
tion over  the  amazement  that  would  be  Melanie's 
when  she,  good,  simple  soul,  thinking  to  find  the  hare 


134  LITTLE  PIERRE 

which  she  had  prepared,  discovered  in  its  stead,  the 
lion  and  the  lioness,  the  he-ass  and  the  she-ass,  the 
elephant  and  his  lady — in  a  word  all  the  animals  that 
had  been  saved  from  the  Flood,  not  omitting  Noah 
and  his  family  whom  I  had  stewed  up  with  the  rest 
by  inadvertence.  But  the  thing  did  not  turn  out  as 
I  had  hoped.  A  most  intolerable  stench  proceeding 
from  the  kitchen,  a  stench  unprovided  for  by  me,  and 
stupefying  to  the  others,  began  to  invade  every  room 
in  the  place.  My  mother,  coughing  and  choking, 
came  running  to  the  kitchen  to  find  out  what  had  hap- 
pened, and  there  discovered  poor  old  Melanie,  gasp- 
ing for  breath,  with  her  basket  still  on  her  arm,  just 
taking  hold  of  the  saucepan  in  which  the  charred  re- 
mains of  the  occupants  of  the  Ark  were  smouldering 
hideously. 

"My  'castrole,'  my  lovely  'castrole' !"  cried  Mela- 
nie, in  accents  of  despair. 

I  had  come  to  triumph  over  the  success  of  my  plot; 
I  remained  to  feel  the  crushing  weight  of  shame  and 
remorse.  And  it  was  in  quavering  tones  that,  at 
Melanie's  summons,  I  revealed  that  the  jugged  hare 
was  to  be  found  in  the  broom  cupboard. 

I  was  not  scolded.  My  father,  paler  than  usual, 
pretended  not  to  see  me.  My  mother's  cheeks  were 
very  flushed,  and  she  looked  at  me  askance,  scanning 
my  face  to  see  whether  she  could  detect  the  symptoms 
of  incipient  crime  or  madness.  But  the  most  deplor- 
able spectacle  of  all  was  presented  by  my  godfather. 


LITTLE  PIERRE  135 

The  corners  of  his  mouth,  usually  framed  so  jovially 
within  a  pair  of  round  cheeks  and  a  fat  chin,  drooped 
most  ruefully.  Behind  his  gold-rimmed  spectacles, 
his  eyes,  so  lately  beaming,  had  ceased  to  twinkle. 

When  Melanie  brought  in  the  hare,  her  eyes  were 
red  and  tears  were  streaming  down  her  cheeks.  I 
could  bear  it  no  longer,  and,  getting  up  from  the 
table,  I  rushed  to  my  poor  old  friend,  hugged  her 
with  all  my  might,  and  burst  into  a  flood  of  tears. 

From  the  pocket  of  her  apron  she  drew  her 
chequered  handkerchief,  gently  wiped  my  eyes  with 
her  knotted  hand  all  smelling  of  parsley,  and  said  in 
a  voice  broken  with  sobs: 

"Don't  cry,  Master  Pierre,  don't  cry!" 

Turning  to  my  mother,  my  godfather  said: 

"Pierrot  is  not  really  a  bad  boy  at  heart;  but  he's 
an  only  child.  He  is  lonely  and  doesn't  know  what 
to  do  with  himself.  Put  him  to  boarding-school.  He 
will  be  under  a  healthy  discipline,  and  will  have  lit- 
tle friends  to  play  with." 

On  hearing  these  words,  I  remembered  the  advice 
which  Aunt  Chausson  had  given  my  mamma,  and  I 
longed  for  a  little  brother  so  that  I  might  not  be  sent 
to  a  boarding-school,  and  also  that  I  might  love  and 
be  loved  by  him. 

I  knew  that  a  brother  is  a  gift  bestowed  by  Na- 
ture, and,  without  being  aware  of  the  conditions  on 
which  the  gift  is  vouchsafed  to  families  in  favour 
with  the  heavenly  powers,  I  was  certain  that,  to  pro- 


136  LITTLE  PIERRE 

duce  it,  nothing  could  replace  that  force  which  causes 
the  seed  to  germinate  and  life  to  flourish  on  the 
earth.  I  had  an  obscure  yet  profound  intuition  of 
the  mysterious  power  which  nourished  me  after  hav- 
ing brought  me  into  the  world,  and  I  was  perfectly 
well  able  to  differentiate  the  works  of  Cybele,  whom 
I  adored  though  I  knew  not  her  name,  from  the  most 
marvellous  of  man's  productions.  It  would  have 
caused  me  no  difficulty  to  believe  that  a  magician 
might  fashion  a  man  capable  of  walking,  speaking 
and  eating,  but  I  could  never  have  persuaded  myself 
that  such  a  man  was  of  the  same  substance  as  a  man 
produced  by  Nature.  In  a  word,  I  abandoned  the 
idea  of  ever  having  a  brother  according  to  the  flesh, 
and  resolved  that  adoption  should  obtain  what  Na- 
ture denied  me. 

To  be  sure,  I  did  not  know  that  the  Emperor  Had- 
rian by  adopting  Antoninus  Pius,  and  Antoninus  by 
adopting  Marcus  Aurelius,  had  given  the  world  for- 
ty-two years  of  tranquil  happiness.  Of  that  I  had  no 
idea,  but,  nevertheless,  it  seemed  to  me  that  adoption 
was  an  excellent  practice.  I  did  not  regard  it  from 
the  strictly  legal  point  of  view,  for  of  jurisprudence 
I  was  completely  ignorant.  At  the  same  time  I 
looked  upon  it  as  a  process  invested  with  a  certain 
solemnity.  That  was  rather  to  my  taste,  and  I  had  a 
vague  notion  that  my  parents  would  put  on  their  best 
clothes  to  receive  the  child  that  I  should  present  to 
them  for  adoption.  The  difficulty  was  to  find  him. 


LITTLE  PIERRE  137 

My  field  of  research  was  very  limited;  I  saw  few 
people,  and  none  of  the  families  I  visited  would  have 
consented  to  hand  over  one  of  their  children,  without 
some  powerful  motive,  such  a  motive,  for  example, 
as  compelled  the  mother  of  Moses  to  expose  her  lit- 
tle baby  on  the  banks  of  the  Nile.  Certainly  Ma- 
dame Caumont  would  never  have  agreed  to  part 
with  either  of  her  pumpkins.  It  occurred  to  me  that 
it  might  be  less  difficult  to  obtain  a  little  workhouse 
child  and  I  broached  the  subject  to  my  friend  Morin, 
who  scratched  his  head  and  said  that  to  take  a  foun- 
dling into  one's  family  was  a  very  risky  business,  and 
that,  moreover,  my  parents  could  not  adopt  a  child 
because  they  had  one  already.  Knowing  nothing  of 
the  law,  I  was  quite  unimpressed  by  that  argument, 
and,  in  the  course  of  the  walks  I  took  with  Melanie, 
in  the  Luxembourg,  the  Tuileries,  and  the  Jardin  des 
Plantes,  I  continued  to  look  out  for  a  brother  to 
adopt.  Despite  poor  old  Melanie's  injunctions  to 
the  contrary,  I  went  and  tried  to  make  friends  with 
all  the  little  boys  we  used  to  meet.  I  was  shy,  awk- 
ward, and  delicate-looking,  and  generally  got  noth- 
ing but  taunts  and  contumely  for  my  pains.  Or,  if 
by  any  chance  I  discovered  a  child  as  shy  as  I  was 
myself,  we  parted  from  each  other  without  a  word, 
with  drooping  heads  and  full  hearts,  neither  being 
able  to  make  known  to  the  other  the  affection  that 
stirred  within  him.  The  conviction  was  borne  in 
upon  me  at  that  time  that,  though  not  perfect,  I  was 


138  LITTLE  PIERRE 

more   worthy   than    the    majority    of   other    folk. 

Some  little  time  after  that,  one  autumn  day  when 
I  was  alone  in  the  drawing-room,  I  saw  a  little 
Savoyard,  as  black  as  an  imp,  come  stepping  out 
from  the  chimney.  The  apparition  was  not  so  alarm- 
ing as  diverting. 

Little  Savoyards,  who,  like  that  one,  did  chimney 
sweeping,  were  in  those  days  not  uncommon  in  Paris. 
In  old  houses,  such  as  ours,  the  flues  are  as  wide  as 
the  walls  are  thick,  quite  big  enough  for  a  child  to 
climb  up  them,  and  as  a  rule  the  work  was  performed 
by  little  boys  from  Savoy.  It  used  to  be  said  that 
they  learnt  how  to  climb  from  watching  their  mon- 
keys, but  they  used  to  have  a  rope  with  knots  in  it 
to  help  them.  The  youngster  of  my  story,  all  be- 
smeared with  soot,  with  a  little  brewer's  cap  pulled 
right  down  to  his  ears,  displayed,  when  he  smiled,  a 
set  of  dazzling  white  teeth  and  a  pair  of  bright  red 
lips,  which  he  licked  to  clean  away  the  dirt.  On  his 
shoulders  he  carried  a  coil  of  rope  and  a  trowel,  and 
he  looked  a  little  shrimp  of  a  thing  in  his  vest  and 
shorts.  I  liked  the  look  of  him,  and  asked  his  name. 
He  answered  in  nasal  but  very  gentle  tones  that  he 
was  called  Adeodat,  and  that  he  came  from  Gervex 
near  Bonneville. 

I  went  up  to  him,  and,  with  an  affectionate  ges- 
ture, said: 

"Will  you  be  my  brother?" 

He  rolled  a  pair  of  wondering  eyes  within  his 


LITTLE  PIERRE  139 

black  and  white  harlequin's  mask,  opened  his  mouth 
from  ear  to  ear,  and  nodded  his  head  in  assent. 

Thereupon,  in  a  sort  of  frenzy  of  fraternal  af- 
fection, I  told  him  to  wait  a  moment,  and  rushed 
away  to  the  kitchen.  Ransacking  larder,  cupboard, 
and  pantry,  I  lighted  upon  a  cheese,  of  which  I  forth- 
with took  possession.  It  was  one  of  those  cheeses 
which  they  make  at  Neufchatel,  and  which,  being 
shaped  like  the  wooden  plugs  they  stick  into  the  bung 
holes  (bonde)  of  wine  casks,  have  come  by  the 
name  of  bondon.  This  one  was  in  perfect  condition, 
with  little  red  flecks  showing  here  and  there  on  its 
bluish,  velvety  surface.  I  brought  it  back  to  my 
brother,  who  had  remained  as  stock  still  as  if  he  had 
been  a  clock.  He  rolled  a  pair  of  astonished  eyes, 
and  accepted  it  with  alacrity.  He  drew  his  knife 
from  his  pocket,  began  to  dig  into  the  bondon,  and 
conveyed  large  pieces  of  it  to  his  mouth  on  the  point 
of  the  blade.  He  moved  his  jaws  with  a  grave, 
meditative  deliberation  that  was  doubtless  habitual 
with  him,  never  pausing  a  second  to  take  breath.  At 
this  point  my  mother  came  on  the  scene.  Little  then 
remained  of  the  bondon  but  the  skin.  I  thought  it 
incumbent  on  me  to  explain : 

"Mamma,  this  is  my  brother.  I  have  adopted 
him." 

"That  is  very  nice,"  said  my  mother  smiling.  "But 
he  will  choke  himself.  Give  him  something  to 
drink." 


140  LITTLE  PIERRE 

Melanie,  whom  by  good  luck  I  found  in  the  kit- 
chen, brought  in  a  glass  of  water  coloured  with  a 
little  wine.  My  brother  drank  it  down  at  a  gulp, 
wiped  his  mouth  on  his  sleeve  and  heaved  a  sigh  of 
content.  ji 

My  mother  asked  him  about  his  home,  his  family, 
and  his  circumstances,  and  he  must  have  answered 
becomingly,  for,  when  he  had  gone,  my  mamma 
said: 

"He's  a  nice  little  boy,  that  brother  of  yours." 

She  decided  that  his  master,  who  lived  in  the 
Rue  des  Boulangers,  should  be  asked  to  let  him  come 
to  us  one  Sunday. 

I  must  confess  that  Adeodat,  when  washed  and  in 
his  best  clothes,  pleased  me  less  than  when  wearing 
his  black  brewer's  cap  and  his  mask  of  soot.  He 
had  his  lunch  in  the  kitchen,  where  we  went  to  look 
at  him,  my  mother  and  I,  feeling  a  little  compunction 
at  our  curiosity.  Old  Melanie  signed  to  us  not  to 
come  too  near  for  fear  of  vermin.  He  behaved  with 
perfect  politeness,  but  he  refused  point  blank  to  fall 
to  until  he  had  put  on  his  hat,  which  had  been  hung 
up  on  a  peg.  Such  manners  we  thought  a  little  rus- 
tic. When  one  comes  to  think  of  it,  however,  they 
were  in  reality  very  aristocratic.  In  the  seventeenth 
century  a  man  of  quality  never  sat  down  to  table 
with  his  head  uncovered.  It  was  seemly  that  he 
should  wear  his  hat  during  a  meal,  since  etiquette 
compelled  him  to  be  continually  taking  it  off;  when, 


LITTLE  PIERRE  141 

for  example,  he  received  an  attention  from  his  neigh- 
bour, or  when  he  bestowed  his  services  on  the  lady 
at  his  side.  In  his  new  "Treatise  on  polite  observ- 
ances practised  in  France,"  published  in  Paris  in  the 
year  1702,  M.  Courtin  under  the  heading  "Beha- 
viour at  the  table,"  expressly  states  as  follows:  "If 
a  person  of  rank  proposes  a  health,  or  drinks  to  your 
own,  you  must  remove  your  hat,  bending  forward  a 
little  over  the  table,  until  he  has  drunk.  When  he 
speaks  to  you,  you  must  uncover  before  replying, 
taking  care  not  to  have  your  mouth  full.  The  same 
civility  should  be  observed  whenever  he  addresses 
you  until  he  requests  you  to  desist,  after  which  you 
should  remain  covered,  lest  you  should  weary  him 
with  excessive  ceremony."  Adeodat  wore  his  hat 
during  the  repast  like  an  old  time  courtier  of  the 
days  of  Louis  XIV;  but,  truth  to  tell,  he  did  not 
doff  it  so  often.  He  put  the  meat  on  his  bread  and 
conveyed  the  pieces  to  his  mouth  with  his  knife,  and 
he  was  very  grave.  After  luncheon,  at  my  mother's 
request,  he  sang  to  us,  in  a  voice  scarcely  audible,  a 
folk  song  of  his  native  country: 

"Escouto,  Jeannetto, 
Veux-tu  d'biaux  habit*? 
La  ridetto." 

He  replied  briefly,  and  very  sensibly,  to  my  dear 
mamma's  questions.  We  learnt  that  he  worked  in 
Paris  during  the  winter  and,  when  the  spring 
began  to  draw  near,  returned  on  foot  to  his  own 


142  LITTLE  PIERRE 

country.  His  mother,  being  too  poor  to  buy  a  cow, 
worked  for  hire  in  the  creameries.  He  worked  with 
her  or  went  gathering  myrtle  berries  or  "maurels" 
as  he  called  them,  on  the  mountain  side.  They  lived 
on  pancakes  and  did  not  get  too  much  of  them. 

I  determined  to  save  up  and  buy  a  cow  for  Adeo- 
dat's  mother,  but  I  soon  forgot  all  about  it.  The  lit- 
tle chimney-sweep  went  home  when  the  spring  came. 
Mamma  sent  some"  woollen  garments  and  a  lit- 
tle money  to  his  mother.  And  believing  him  to 
be  a  steady  and  intelligent  boy  she  wrote  asking  the 
village  schoolmaster  to  teach  him  the  three  "R's" 
saying  that  she  would  pay  the  expense.  Adeodat 
wrote  a  letter  in  printed  characters  to  thank  her. 

I  often  inquired  for  my  brother.  I  asked  for  him 
again  as  the  winter  came  on. 

"Your  brother  is  staying  in  his  own  country," 
answered  my  mother,  fearing  lest  she  should  grieve 
me  by  saying  more. 

My  brother  Adeodat  was  never  destined  to  come 
back  again.  He  lay  sleeping  in  the  little  cemetery 
of  his  native  village.  My  mother  had  heard  about 
him  from  the  schoolmaster  at  Gervex,  but  she  never 
showed  me  the  letter.  It  informed  her  that  little 
Adeodat  had  died  of  meningitis  without  ever  know- 
ing how  ill  he  was,  only  wondering  to  find  his  head 
so  heavy.  A  few  hours  before  he  died  he  spoke  of 
the  kind  Madame  Noziere  and  sang  his  song: 

"Escouto,  Jeannetto  .  .  ." 


CHAPTER  XVIII 

OLD  MOTHER  COCHELET 

NE  morning,  having  accompanied 
old  Melanie  into  her  attic,  I  ex- 
amined with  greater  attention  than 
usual  the  coloured  quilt  which  she 
had  on  her  bed  and  which,  as  I  have 
already  mentioned,  was  ornamented 
with  a  design  representing  a  village  school  treat. 
The  subject  was  printed  in  red  and  many  times 
repeated.  It  seemed  to  me  to  have  a  grace  about 
it.  It  appealed  to  my  imagination  and  excited  my 
curiosity.  Melanie  upbraided  me  for  wasting  my 
time  on  silly  things. 

"What  can  you  find  to  admire  in  that  old  thing, 
Pierrot?  It's  been  patched  over  and  over  again. 
Madame  Sainte-Lucie,  where  I  was  in  service,  had 
it  all  spick  and  span  on  her  death-bed,  and  I  got 
it  when  the  young  gentlemen  shared  out  their 
mother's  wardrobe  among  the  servants." 
Still  I  went  on  plying  her  with  questions. 
"Who  is  that  pretty  young  lady  the  gentleman 
is  crowning  with  roses?  Why  these  drums  and 
trumpets,  these  maidens  all  in  a  row,  these  peasants 
hand  in  hand?" 

"Where  do  you  see  all  that,  mon  petit  monsieur? 


144  LITTLE  PIERRE 

You  can't  possibly  see  all  those  things  there.  I 
must  put  on  my  glasses  and  look." 

She  perceived  that  I  had  invented  nothing. 

"Upon  my  word,  it  is  so,  sure  enough.  They're 
all  in  the  picture,  young  maidens,  gentlemen,  coun- 
tryfolk, and  goodness  knows  what  besides.  Well, 
I  never!  I've  had  that  quilt  on  my  bed  fifty  years 
and  I  never  noticed  those  things.  Why,  if  anybody 
had  asked  me  what  colour  it  was  I  shouldn't  have 
been  able  to  tell  them.  And  I've  darned  it  often 
enough  tool" 

As  I  was  coming  out  of  the  room  with  Melanie 
I  heard  a  noise  of  crutches  and  footsteps  tapping 
along  at  the  dark  end  of  the  corridor,  and  slowly 
getting  nearer.  I  stopped,  and  was  frightened  out 
of  my  life  when  I  saw,  slowly  emerging  from  the 
shadow,  a  hideous  old  hag,  bent  double,  her  back 
where  her  head  ought  to  be,  and  a  cavernous  look- 
ing countenance  on  her  chest,  her  right  eye  covered 
up  with  an  enormous  green  shade.  I  seized  hold  of 
Melanie's  apron.  When  the  apparition  had  gone  by, 
she  told  me  it  was  old  Mother  Cochelet.  Melanie 
could  tell  me  nothing  about  her,  never  speaking  with 
her,  or,  indeed,  with  anyone,  an  assertion  which  my 
aged  friend  often  repeated  but  which  must  not  be 
interpreted  according  to  the  strict  meaning  of  the 
word,  but  which  should  be  taken  rather  in  the  light 
of  a  testimony  rendered  by  herself  to  her  own  dis- 
cretion. Old  Mother  Cochelet  lived  in  a  noisome 
hovel  at  the  far  end  of  the  passage.  However,  she 


LITTLE  PIERRE  145 

was  not  believed  to  be  in  want  because  she  had  three 
cats  for  which  she  bought  a  pennyworth  of  lights 
every  morning.  M.  Bellaguet  had  frequently  offered 
to  get  her  into  an  almshouse,  but  she  refused  with 
such  energy  that  he  had  to  give  up  the  idea. 

"She  is  proud,"  said  Melanie.  Then  lowering 
her  voice,  she  added:  "Elle  est  pour  le  roi"  (Mela- 
nie pronounced  it  roue).  "She  is  for  the  King." 
Folk  say  that  up  in  her  garret,  where  everything  is 
rotting  away,  she  has  a  magnificent  counterpane  em- 
broidered with  fleurs  de  lis. 

That  was  all  I  got  to  know  about  Mother  Coche- 
let.  But  some  time  later  on,  when  we  were  taking 
our  walk  in  the  Tuileries,  Melanie  and  I,  we  came 
across  the  old  woman,  who  was  sitting  on  one  of  the 
seats  and  offering  a  pinch  of  snuff  to  an  old  mili- 
tary pensioner.  She  was  wearing  a  shabby  black 
straw  hat  over  her  fluted  cap,  in  the  1820  manner, 
and  had  a  dirty  old  yellow  shawl  wrapped  round 
her  shoulders.  Her  chin,  resting  on  her  crutch,  was 
shaking,  and  the  shade  over  her  eye  was  trembling. 

The  pensioner's  nose  and  chin  were  like  a  pair 
of  nut-crackers.  They  were  talking  together. 

"Let's  go  and  sit  somewhere  else,"  said  Melanie. 

And  she  got  up.  But  anxious  to  hear  what  Mother 
Cochelet  was  saying,  I  went  close  up  to  the  seat 
where  she  was  sitting.  She  wasn't  talking,  she  was 
singing.  She  was  singing,  or  rather  she  was  hum- 
ming: 

"Que  ne  mis-je  la  fougire?" 


CHAPTER  XIX 

MADAME    LAROQUE   AND   THE    SIEGE    OF    GRANVILLE 

[ADAME  LAROQUE  had  apart- 
ments in  the  same  house  as  our- 
selves, but  at  the  far  end  of  the 
court,  and  there  she  lived  with  her 
daughter,  Therese  and  her  parrot, 
Navarino.  I  used  to  catch  sight 
of  her  from  my  window,  and  sometimes  from 
my  bed.  Her  face  was  hale,  and  puckered  like 
the  skin  of  apples  that  have  been  stored  in  a 
cellar  for  the  winter.  She  used  to  appear  to  me 
at  her  nasturtium-bordered  window,  betwixt  a 
pot  of  carnations  and  the  pagoda-shaped  parrot's 
cage,  looking  like  one  of  those  worthy  house- 
wives the  old  Flemish  masters  used  to  portray  in  an 
embrasure  of  masonry  and  flowers.  Every  Satur- 
day, after  dinner,  which  in  those  days  was  over  about 
six  o'clock,  my  mother  put  on  her  hat  to  go  across 
the  courtyard,  and  took  me  with  her  to  spend  the 
evening  with  the  Laroque  ladies.  She  took  her 
work  in  a  bag,  so  that  she  might  do  her  sewing  or 
embroidery  with  her  neighbours.  The  other  ladies 
who  visited  there  did  the  same.  It  was  a  survival 

of  the  old  regime  by  no  means  peculiar  to  the  middle 

146 


LITTLE  PIERRE  147 

and  lower-middle  classes,  as  one  might  think  to-day. 
It  was,  indeed,  a  custom  observed  in  the  time  of 
Louis  XVI,  by  the  highest  aristocracy,  who  were, 
nevertheless,  far  from  being  wedded  to  the  simple 
life.  In  the  reign  of  Louis  XVI,  women  of  the 
highest  rank  used  to  do  their  sewing  together.  Ma- 
dame Vigee-Lebrun  relates  in  her  memoirs  that,  dur- 
ing the  period  of  the  Royalist  emigration,  she  was 
received  in  Vienna  by  the  Comtesse  de  Thoun,  and 
that,  when  there,  she  used  to  take  her  place  at  the 
large  table  round  which  the  princesses  of  the  court 
worked  at  their  tapestry  frames.  These  remarks  of 
mine  are  not  intended  to  convey  the  impression  that 
my  dear  mamma  and  I  went  once  a  week  to  call  on 
princesses. 

Madame  Laroque  was  an  old  lady  of  very  sim- 
ple habits,  but  in  diligence,  in  patience,  and  in  quali- 
ties of  the  heart  she  was  among  the  great,  and  she 
was  endowed  with  a  wisdom  in  domestic  affairs  that 
never  failed  her  in  good  or  evil  fortune.  She  bore 
within  her  the  experiences  of  well  nigh  a  century  of 
French  national  life  and  of  two  regimes,  the  old 
and  the  new,  united  and  welded  by  the  hearts  and 
minds  of  the  women  who,  like  her,  threw  themselves, 
after  the  manner  of  David's  Sabine  Women,  between 
the  contending  parties. 

Rich  and  comely,  descended  from  Normandy  yeo- 
men of  Republican  sentiments,  Marie  Rauline  was 
of  marriageable  age  when  the  wars  of  Vendee  broke 


148  LITTLE  PIERRE 

out.  When  I  knew  her,  she  was  over  eighty, 
and  as  she  sat  in  her  easy  chair,  knitting  stockings, 
she  used  to  tell  stories  of  her  young  days.  Her 
friends  had  given  up  listening  to  them  because  she 
told  them  every  day  and  sometimes,  if  she  had  the 
opportunity,  several  times  a  day.  Such  was  the  tale 
of  the  young  suitor,  who  being  no  taller  than  a 
jack  boot,  had  been  rejected  as  unfit  for  military 
service,  and,  since  the  Republic  would  have  none  of 
him,  Marie  Rauline  would  have  none  of  him  eithef. 
She  used  generally  to  finish  off  the  story  by  singing 
the  pretty  air: 

"II  etait  un  petit  homme 
Qui  s'appelait  Guillen 
Carabi." 

The  story  Madame  Laroque  was  most  fond  of  tell- 
ing and  the  one  I  delighted  most  to  hear  was  the 
story  of  the  siege  of  Granville. 

Marie  Rauline  married  in  the  year  IV  a  soldier 
of  the  Republic,  named  Eugene  Laroque,  who  sub- 
sequently became  a  captain  in  the  Imperial  army. 
He  took  part  in  the  Spanish  campaign,  and  being  am- 
bushed by  some  of  the  irregular  troops  of  Julian 
Sanchez  perished  by  the  hand  of  an  assassin.  Left 
a  widow  with  two  daughters,  Madame  Laroque  lived 
in  Paris  on  the  proceeds  of  a  little  drapery  busi- 
ness. Her  elder  daughter  took  the  veil  and  became 
Superior  of  the  Dames  du  Saint-Sang  at  Crecy;  she 
was  known  as  Mother  Seraphine.  The  other  made 
a  small  fortune  as  a  dressmaker.  When  I  knew 


LITTLE  PIERRE  149 

them  they  were  already  advanced  in  years.  Mother 
Seraphine,  whom  I  saw  but  seldom,  impressed  me  by 
the  noble  simplicity  of  her  bearing.  Mademoiselle 
Therese,  her  younger  sister,  I  liked  for  her  merry 
and  equable  disposition.  She  was  a  great  hand  at 
making  betises.  Now  betises  was  the  name  people 
gave  in  those  days  to  caramels  served  in  little  paper 
wrappers,  a  thing  I  used  to  look  upon  as  a  triumph 
of  art.  She  was  also  a  very  good  pianist. 

Whenever  we  went  to  visit  the  Laroques,  we  were 
always  sure  to  find  Mademoiselle  Julie,  who  believed 
in  ghosts  and  whose  friendship  I  cultivated  despite 
the  fact  that  she  was  a  withered,  crabbed  creature. 
But  she  told  ghost  stories,  and  spoke  of  dire  and 
dreadful  things  to  come,  of  unheard-of  marvels. 
And,  ever  since  I  was  five  years  old,  my  faith  in  evil 
spirits  has  needed  a  good  deal  of  bolstering  up. 

Alas,  I  found  a  snake  in  the  grass  at  Mesdames 
Laroques',  and  that  was  Mademoiselle  Alphonsine 
Dusuel,  who,  in  days  gone  by,  had  been  wont  to  stick 
pins  into  my  legs,  what  time  she  hailed  me  as  her 
"treasure."  I  still  used  to  complain  to  my  mother 
about  the  horrible  cruelties  perpetrated  by  Al- 
phonsine, but,  in  reality,  I  was  more  fright- 
ened than  hurt,  or  rather,  to  tell  the  whole 
truth,  I  was  really  neither  hurt  nor  fright- 
ened. She  didn't  so  much  as  notice  my  pres- 
ence now.  Alphonsine  was  fast  growing  up  into  a 
young  lady;  the  perfidies  that  she  perpetrated  now 


ISO  LITTLE  PIERRE 

were  less  simple  in  their  nature,  and  had  other  ob- 
jects in  view  than  a  little  boy  like  me.  I  saw  well 
enough  that  she  liked  to  practise  her  wiles  on  a 
nephew  of  Mademoiselle  Therese.  His  name  was 
Fulgence  Rauline;  he  played  the  violin  and  was  go- 
ing to  attend  classes  at  the  Conservatoire.  Although 
I  was  not  jealous  by  nature,  and  although  Alphon- 
sine  was  plain  and  her  face  all  over  freckles,  I  would 
still  have  preferred  her  to  go  on  sticking  pins  into 
my  legs.  No,  I  wasn't  jealous  and,  if  I  had  been, 
it  would  not  have  been  about  one  of  Alphonsine's 
favourites;  but,  being  wrapped  up  in  myself  and 
eager  for  attention  and  love,  I  wanted  the  whole 
world  to  concern  itself  with  me,  even  though  it  were 
but  to  torment  me.  At  the  age  of  five  I  had  not 
succeeded  in  getting  rid  of  the  old  Adam. 

When  the  ladies,  old  or  young,  had  grown  tired  of 
sewing  and  folded  up  their  work,  we  played  the  game 
of  Goose,  or  Loto.  I  didn't  like  Loto  at  all.  I  am 
not  saying  that  I  could  form  any  intelligent  estimate 
of  the  dismal  stupidity  of  the  thing,  but  it  is  a  fact 
that  it  did  not  satisfy  my  young  ideas ;  the  thing  was 
all  figures  and  symbols ;  it  did  not  appeal  to  my  im- 
agination. My  partners  also  must  have  found  it  too 
abstract  for  their  taste,  since  they  employed  all  man- 
ner of  things  to  liven  it  up ;  not  invented  out  of  their 
own  heads  certainly,  but  handed  down  from  their 
forbears.  They  likened  the  Arabic  symbols,  for  ex- 
ample, to  some  tangible  object;  the  figure  7  was  a 


LITTLE  PIERRE  151 

shovel,  8  was  a  pumpkin,  n  a  pair  of  legs,  22  a 
couple  of  chicken,  33,  two  hunchbacks,  or  else  they 
would  embellish  the  cold  statement  of  the  number 
with  some  poetic  tag.  Then  there  were  some  very 
old  names  given  to  the  numbers,  which  only  Madame 
Laroque  knew  perfectly,  such  as  "i,  a  hair  of  Mat- 
thew's head,"  "2,  the  Testaments  Old  and  New;" 
doubtless  these  additions  relieved  the  game  of  some 
of  its  monotony,  but,  all  the  same,  I  found  it  too 
abstract  for  my  taste.  The  noble  game  of  Goose 
which  was  in  vogue  among  the  ancient  Greeks  de- 
lighted me  beyond  measure.  In  it  everything  lives 
and  speaks,  it  is  Nature  and  Destiny  themselves, 
it  is  as  marvellous  as  it  is  true,  and  as  orderly  as  it  is 
hazardous.  The  prophetic  geese  stationed  at  every 
"nine"  seemed  to  me  like  divine  beings  and,  as  in 
those  days  I  was  prone  to  adore  animals,  these  great 
white  birds  filled  me  with  awe.  Their  role  was  that 
of  mystery,  all  the  rest  belonged  to  the  domain  of 
reason.  When  I  was  held  up  at  the  hostelry,  I  could 
smell  the  meat  roasting.  I  fell  into  the  well  on  the 
edge  of  which,  for  my  salvation  or  my  ruin,  stood 
a  pretty  peasant  girl  with  crimson  stomacher  and 
white  apron.  I  lost  myself  in  the  maze,  where  it 
caused  me  no  surprise  to  find  a  Chinese  kiosk,  such 
was  my  ignorance  of  Cretan  art.  I  fell  off  the  bridge 
into  the  river.  I  was  flung  into  prison.  I  escaped 
death  by  a  hair's  breadth,  and  at  last  I  won  my  way 
to  the  wood  guarded  by  the  Heavenly  Goose,  the 


152  LITTLE  PIERRE 

dispenser  of  all  felicity.  Sometimes,  however,  hav- 
ing had  my  fill  of  adventures,  like  Sinbad  the  Sailor, 
I  gave  up  tempting  Providence.  I  dared  not  ap- 
proach the  well  or  the  bridge,  the  labyrinth  or  the 
prison ;  I  went  and  sat  me  down  on  a  little  red  stool 
at  Madame  Laroque's  feet,  and  there,  well  away 
from  the  table  and  the  lamp,  I  got  her  to  tell  me 
the  story  of  the  siege  of  Granville. 

And  Madame  Laroque,  as  she  knitted  a  stocking, 
told  me  the  story  which  I  here  reproduce  word  for 
word: 

"On  leaving  Fougeres,  M.  de  la  Rochejacquelin, 
who  was  in  command  of  the  brigands,  was  for  going 
to  Rennes,  but  some  emigres,  disguised  as  peasants, 
came  to  him  with  letters  and  gold  from  England, 
concealed  in  hollow  sticks.  Thereupon,  M.  Henri, 
as  they  used  to  call  him  among  themselves,  com- 
manded the  brigands  to  proceed  to  Granville,  be- 
cause these  gentry  had  a  promise  from  the  Eng- 
lish to  send  ships  of  war  to  attack  the  town  from 
the  sea,  while  the  brigands  attacked  it  on  land.  But 
no  reliance  ought  to  be  placed  on  the  promises  of 
the  English.  I  heard  the  same  thing  said  later  on  by 
a  man  from  Bressuire.  These  are  things  I  heard 
with  my  own  ears  and  saw  with  my  own  eyes.  The 
brigands  arrived  in  their  thousands  at  Granville. 
They  came  in  such  numbers  that  you  could  see  them 
from  the  promenade  swarming  like  ants  over  the 
foreshore.  The  General  commanding  in  the  town 


LITTLE  PIERRE  153 

marched  out  to  meet  them  with  the  volunteers  from 
the  Manche,  and  the  Paris  gunners,  who  wore  caps 
of  liberty  tattooed  in  blue  on  their  arms,  with  the 
words  'Liberty  or  Death.'  But  the  number  of  brig- 
ands kept  on  increasing;  they  stretched  as  far  as 
the  eye  could  see,  and  M.  Henri,  who  looked  like 
a  young  girl,  bore  himself  gallantly  as  their  com- 
mander. Then  the  General  realized  that  they  were 
too  many  for  him.  His  name  was  Peyre.  There 
were  good  and  bad  reports  going  about  concern- 
ing him,  as  there  were  concerning  every  one  who 
was  in  the  public  eye  in  those  days.  All  the  same  he 
was  a  straightforward  man,  and  commanded  con- 
siderable resources. 

"That  day,  my  mother  being  ill  in  bed,  I  went  to 
the  Town  Hall  with  our  old  linen,  which  had  been 
requisitioned  by  the  authorities.  The  guns  were 
rumbling  and  a  thick  smoke  hung  over  the  outlying 
parts  of  the  town.  Men  were  going  about  shout- 
ing, 'We  are  betrayed,  they  are  coming;  every  man 
for  himself.'  The  women  were  shrieking  loud 
enough  to  wake  the  dead.  Then  citizen  Desmaisons 
rushed  on  to  the  promenade  wearing  his  plumed 
hat  and  his  tricolour  scarf  and  I  saw  him,  quite  close 
to  me,  reel  like  a  drunken  man,  clutch  at  his  breast 
and  fall  face  forwards.  He  had  had  a  bullet  through 
the  heart.  And,  despite  the  terror  I  was  in,  I  re- 
member thinking  that  dying  was  a  pretty  quick  busi- 
ness. People  were  not  taking  any  precautions  at 


154  LITTLE  PIERRE 

the  time  and  two  women  had  just  fallen  on  the  prom- 
enade. I  managed  to  reach  home  by  sidling  along 
close  up  to  the  wall  and  found  a  Paris  gunner  at 
the  door.  He  had  come  to  ask  for  some  wood  in 
order  to  make  the  cannon  balls  red  hot.  'It's 
warm,'  said  he.  He  was  joking,  because  it  was 
blowing  a  gale  and  you  could  feel  the  sting  of  the 
coming  winter. 

"I  said  to  him,  'Come  and  take  some  wood.' 
Thereupon  the  Chappedelaine  girl  comes  rushing  up 
and  says,  'Don't  you  give  him  my  wood,  Marie. 
Isn't  the  place  burning  quite  enough  as  it  is?  Haven't 
there  been  enough  Christians  roasted  like  swine? 
You  can  smell  them  from  here.  If  you  give  him 
wood  you'll  get  what  you  deserve;  when  the  Ven- 
deans  get  in  they'll  put  you  to  death.'  It  was  fear 
that  made  her  say  these  things,  for  there  were  well- 
to-do  people  in  the  town  who  were  paying  money 
to  get  the  brigands  in.  'Mathilde,'  said  I,  'you  can 
take  my  word  for  it  that,  if  these  gentry  take  the 
town  they  will  restore  the  toll  and  bring  in  the  Eng- 
lish. However,  if  you  want  to  go  on  being  a  slave 
and  to  become  an  Englishwoman  yourself,  that's 
your  look  out.  I'm  going  to  remain  free  and  a 
Frenchwoman.  Long  live  the  Republic!'  Then  the 
Parisian  tried  to  kiss  me,  but  I  slapped  his  face,  for 
the  look  of  the  thing.  Meanwhile  people  began 
shouting,  'Look,  they're  getting  ready  to  storm.'  I 
was  afraid,  and  still  more  curious  than  afraid.  I 


LITTLE  PIERRE  155 

slipped  down  to  the  promenade  and  saw  the  Ven- 
deans  thrusting  their  bayonets  into  the  walls  to  make 
themselves  a  foothold.  But  the  Republicans  were 
firing  on  them  from  the  top  of  the  ramparts  and 
bringing  down  the  luckless  assailants  who  crashed 
down  on  the  rocks  beneath.  At  last,  seeing  the  tide 
was  out  and  that  it  was  no  use  waiting  for  the  Eng- 
lish to  come  and  help  them,  they  took  to  flight,  fling- 
ing away  their  sabots.  The  shore  was  strewn  with 
corpses  still  clasping  their  beads  in  their  rigid  fin- 
gers. The  Chappedelaine  girl  shook  her  fist  at  them 
and  said  they  had  died  too  comfortably.  And  then 
all  the  people  who  had  been  for  surrendering  th'e 
town  began  to  vilify  them  for  fear  they  should  be 
denounced  as  traitors  to  the  Republic." 

Thus  spake  Madame  Laroque,  and  this  story  of 
an  event  that  happened  more  than  a  hundred  and 
twenty  years  ago  now,  I  heard  from  the  lips  of  an 
eye-witness. 


CHAPTER  XX 

"'Twas  thus  those  monsters  fell  did  grind  their  teeth." 

— Ronsard. 

HEY  were  dreary  times  at  home  just 
then.  My  father  was  worried,  my 
mother  agitated,  and  old  Melanie 
inclined  to  weep.  The  chilly 
silence  that  reigned  at  meals  was 
broken  only  by  the  briefest  of 
utterances. 

"Has  Gomboust  paid  up?" 
"Gomboust  did  not  put  in  an  appearance." 
"Did  you  see  the  bailiff?" 

"Rampon  has  advanced  the  money,  but  the  in- 
terest he  wants,  good  heavens !  The  man's  a  regular 
vampire!" 

Then  silence  again.  Their  faces  were  mournful. 
Joy  being  as  necessary  to  me  as  sunlight  to  plants,  I 
drooped  and  languished  in  this  atmosphere  of  gloom. 
They  were  dreary  days.  My  father,  who  of  all 
men  in  the  world  had  the  least  aptitude  for  busi- 
ness, had  gone  and  mixed  himself  up  in  some  specu- 
lation or  other.  Why  he  did  so  I  don't  know;  blind 
confidence  in  a  friend,  perhaps,  or  because  he  wanted 
to  go  out  of  his  way  to  oblige,  or  because  he  thought 
he  saw  a  way  of  keeping  his  wife  in  ease  and  com- 

156 


LITTLE  PIERRE  157 

fort  and  providing  handsomely  for  his  son's  educa- 
tion, or  for  some  philanthropic  reason,  or,  good 
Lord  I  it  may  have  been  pure  wool-gathering  and  ab- 
sence of  mind.  Anyhow,  he  had  joined  his  friend 
Gomboust  in  a  scheme  to  exploit  the  springs  at  Saint 
Firmin,  which  had  been  analysed  by  various  emi- 
nent chemists  and  had  been  recognized  by  several 
members  of  the  medical  profession  as  possessing  val- 
uable curative  properties  in  disorders  of  the  stom- 
ach, liver,  and  kidneys. 

This  venture,  which  was  to  bring  in  enormous 
profits,  promptly  went  smash.  It  would  be  quite  im- 
possible for  me  to  define  the  nature  of  the  company 
that  was  formed  to  exploit  this  mineral  water,  or  to 
indicate  the  share  of  it  that  was  allotted  to  my 
father.  That  were  a  task  for  Balzac,  not  for  Pier- 
rot. I  readily  confine  my  account  of  the  matter  to 
the  impressions  left  of  it  on  my  childish  brain. 

Adelestan  Gomboust,  who  was  the  proprietor  of 
the  Saint  Firmin  Springs  in  the  Hautes-Pyrenees, 
was  the  owner  of  a  tall  paralytic  body  which  gave, 
so  to  speak,  no  sign  of  life.  Lids  that  never  moved 
covered  his  hollow  eyes.  Between  his  shrunken  lips 
you  could  just  discern  the  gleam  of  a  couple  of 
white  teeth.  His  face  was  like  a  dead  man's,  but 
from  his  mummy-like  mouth  there  issued  a  voice  of 
delicious  clearness,  which,  like  a  silver  flute,  pro- 
duced modulations  of  sweetest  sound.  As  he  came 
along  guided  by  a  child,  and  leaning  upon  crutches, 


158  LITTLE  PIERRE 

there  was  something  uncanny  in  his  appearance  that 
sent  a  chill  through  one's  marrow. 

"Here's  bad  luck  come  our  way,"  sighed  Melanie, 
as  she  saw  him,  and  whether  it  was  that  she  could 
not  remember  his  name  or  whether  she  thought  the 
name  an  unlucky  one,  she  never  uttered  it,  but  al- 
ways announced  him  with  bated  breath  as  "The  gen- 
tleman with  the  skin  eyes." 

I  often  used  to  find  myself  alone  in  the  drawing- 
room  with  this  inanimate  body.  It  frightened  me, 
and  I  hardly  dared  to  look  at  it.  But  no  sooner  did 
it  open  its  mouth  than  the  charm  began  to  work. 
Gomboust  taught  me  how  to  rig  a  boat,  fly  a  kite, 
and  make  a  Hero's  fountain.  The  music  of  his 
voice,  the  orderly  sequence  of  his  thoughts,  gave  me 
the  utmost  delight,  however  little  I  may  have  been 
able  to  appreciate  the  art  of  good  speaking.  With 
his  expressionless  face  and  his  motionless  body  the 
man  was  the  very  personification  of  persuasiveness. 
I  was  trying  to  think  just  now  how  it  was  my  father, 
who  was  so  prudent,  and  so  indifferent  to  money-get- 
ting, came  to  get  mixed  up  in  the  Saint-Firmin  Com- 
pany. The  reason  however  is  evident;  he  had  heark- 
ened to  the  voice  of  Gomboust.  Gomboust's  utter- 
ances had  the  same  effect  on  my  parents  as  they  had 
on  me,  and  this  is  a  proof  of  it: 

It  was,  I  remember,  one  evening,  one  of  the  dark- 
est of  those  dismal  times.  M.  Paulin,  a  solicitor, 
a  suave  man,  M.  Bourisse  a  chamber  counsel  who 


LITTLE  PIERRE  159 

was  suaver  than  M.  Paulin,  M.  Philipeaux,  who  was 
suaver  than  M.  Bourisse,  M.  Rampon,  who  advanced 
money  on  weekly  loans,  and  was  suaver  than  M. 
Philipeaux,  had  all  suavely  acted  on  my  father's 
artless  and  timid  mind  till  they  had  thoroughly  and 
completely  frightened  him.  My  mother,  who  be- 
held in  Gomboust  the  arch-contriver  of  our  ruin, 
being  informed  by  Melanie  that  "the  man  with 
the  skin  eyes"  wished  to  see  her,  gave  him  a  very 
chilly  reception  in  the  lobby,  where  I  was  hiding  un- 
derneath a  form  pretending  that  it  was  the  cave  of 
the  nymph  Eucharis,  and  that  I  was  Telemachus.  I 
lay  low  and  listened  to  my  mother  as  she  heaped  re- 
proaches on  the  head  of  the  motionless  Gomboust. 
I  felt,  as  it  were,  a  blow  at  the  heart  when  she  said 
to  him:  "Monsieur,  you  have  deceived  us;  you  are 
not  an  honest  man." 

After  a  prolonged  silence,  Gomboust  made  reply. 
His  voice  trembled  and  emotion  made  it  even  more 
musical  than  usual.  I  did  not  understand  what  he 
said.  He  spoke  at  great  length.  My  mother  lis- 
tened to  him  without  interrupting.  From  the  place 
where  I  lay  concealed  I  watched  her  face  grow 
calmer  and  her  expression  soften.  She  was  under 
the  spell.  At  luncheon  next  day  my  father  showed 
her  a  paper  which  she  glanced  through,  and  handed 
back  to  him  exclaiming:  "That's  another  of  Gom- 
boust's  scoundrelly  tricks  I" 

Even  now  I  don't  know  all  the  rights  of  that  Saint- 


160  LITTLE  PIERRE 

Firmin  Mineral  Water  Company,  for  I  never  had 
the  curiosity  to  read  the  documents  concerning  it, 
which  I  found  among  my  father's  papers,  and  all  of 
which  were  stolen  from  me  together  with  the  rest  of 
the  family  records.  But  I  have  good  reason  to  believe 
that  my  mother  did  Gomboust  no  injustice  when  she 
pronounced  him  miserly,  rapacious,  and  unscrupu- 
lous, in  short,  a  bad  lot;  and  it  puzzles  me  now,  when 
I  think  of  it,  how  it  was  that  this  unhappy  man,  who 
was  three  parts  blind  and  almost  incapable  of  move- 
ment, cut  off  so  to  speak  from  the  world,  a  burden 
to  himself  and  to  others,  this  man  who  dwelt  not 
so  much  in  a  living  body  as  in  a  coffin  of  flesh,  should 
be  so  enamoured  of  money  as  to  commit  acts  of 
treachery  and  cruelty  for  the  sake  of  it.  What,  in 
heaven's  name,  was  he  going  to  do  with  his  money? 
There  are  some  things  that  incline  me  to  think 
that  from  inexperience  and  sensitiveness  my  parents 
exaggerated  their  responsibility  in  this  matter  of 
The  Saint-Firmin  Mineral  Water  concern.  They 
were  the  victims  of  legal  and  financial  sharks.  Ram- 
pon,  the  obliging  Rampon,  deemed  it  his  duty  for- 
sooth to  come  to  the  rescue  of  a  distinguished  medi- 
cal practitioner  and  a  worthy  citizen  and  parent,  and 
he  squeezed  us  dry.  In  point  of  fact,  it  was  no  very 
tremendous  catastrophe,  but  it  left  us  with  nothing. 
My  mother's  poor  little  bits  of  jewellery,  not  much 
in  the  way  of  gold  and  less  still  in  the  way  of  dia- 
monds and  pearls,  the  odds  and  ends  of  the  old 


LITTLE  PIERRE  161 

family  plate,  battered  and  dented,  the  sugar-basin 
with  the  swan  handles,  the  coffee-pot  with  my  grand- 
father Saturnin  Parmentier's  crest  upon  it,  the  mas- 
sive soup-ladle,  all  had  to  be  pawned  to  pay  the 
lawyers'  fees. 

One  day  my  father  came  home  and  said: 
"Well,  it's  done;  Le  Mimeur  is  soldi" 
Le  Mimeur  was  a  little  farm  near  Chartres,  and 
it  was  the  last  bit  of  family  property  that  my  mother 
had  to  call  her  own.  I  had  been  taken  to  Le  Mi- 
meur when  I  was  quite  a  little  boy,  and  all  I  re- 
membered of  it  was  a  white  butterfly  on  a  bramble 
hedge,  the  shrill  flight  of  the  dragon  flies  among  the 
wind-swayed  reeds,  a  startled  field  mouse  scamper- 
ing along  a  wall,  and  a  little  greyish  flower  shaped 
like  a  snout  which  my  mother  pointed  out  to  me, 
saying:  "Look,  Pierrot,  isn't  it  pretty?"  * 

That  summed  up  Le  Mimeur  for  me,  and  it 
seemed  a  strange,  a  cruel  thing  that  the  hedge,  the 
rushes,  the  blue  grey  flowers,  the  field  mouse,  the 
butterfly  and  the  dragon-flies  should  all  be  sold.  I 
could  not  quite  see  how  the  sale  could  be  carried  out. 
But  my  father  said  it  had  been  done,  so  there  it  was. 
And  I  brooded  within  me  on  this  sorrowful  mystery. 
Like  all  the  other  things,  Le  Mimeur  went  to  Ram- 
pon,  who,  nevertheless,  could  not  take  it  within  him 
into  the  next  world.  All  dead  men  are  paupers, 
Gomboust,  and  Rampon,  no  less  than  the  rest.  If 
I  knew  in  what  cemetery  Gomboust  lies  buried,  I 

•It  was  probably  the  toad-flax. 


162  LITTLE  PIERRE 

would  go  and  whisper  these  words  among  the  grasses 
that  cover  his  grave:  "Where  is  now  thy  treasure?" 

Thus  it  came  about  that,  in  my  very  earliest  child- 
hood, I  learned  to  know  what  manner  of  men  are 
lawyers,  and  usurers.  They  are  an  immortal  race. 
All  things  about  them  suffer  change.  They  alone  hold 
true  to  type.  Even  as  Rabelais  portrayed  them  so 
they  remain  to-day.  They  are  the  same  to  their  beak 
and  claws,  and  even  to  their  unintelligible  jargon. 

It  was  some  five  years  after  the  dark  days  which 
I  have  described.  Calmer  times  had  supervened,  and 
I  was  at  school,  and  our  master,  M.  Triaire}  had 
been  telling  us  about  the  Harpies  in  the  -/Eneid. 
Those  sinister  fowl,  those  human  headed  vultures 
which,  swooping  down  upon  the  table  of  the  pious 
-/Eneas  and  his  companions,  snatched  away  the  meat, 
defiled  the  victuals,  and  spread  abroad  a  loathsome 
stench,  I  knew  them  right  enough !  More  expert  in 
such  matters  than  my  fellow  scholars,  I  knew  them 
for  lawyers  and  hucksterers. 

But  how  wholesome  and  pleasant  is  that  cave  of 
harpies,  which  Virgil  describes  for  us  as  all  befouled 
with  dung  and  dripping  flesh,  compared  with  the 
office  and  green  cardboard  files  of  a  man  of  law. 

It  is  because  I  loathed  and  detested  those  mur- 
derous paper  holders  that  I  never  could  endure  to 
have  any  files  or  filing  cases  about  me.  And  so  I 
have  always  mislaid  my  papers,  my  poor  harmless 
papers. 


CHAPTER  XXI 

THE  PAPAGAY 

HEN  she  came  in  with  the  coffee,  old 
Melanie  informed  us  that  the 
Comtesse  Michaud's  parrot  had 
escaped.  The  people  thought  they 
could  see  it  on  M.  Bellaguet's  roof. 
I  got  up  from  the  table  and  rushed 
to  the  window.  In  the  courtyard  a  group,  consist- 
ing of  the  concierge  and  a  few  domestics,  were 
gazing  upwards  and  pointing  towards  the  gutter 
round  the  roof.  My  godfather,  coffee-cup  in  hand, 
followed  me  to  the  window  and  asked  where  the 
popinjay  was. 

"There,"  said  I,  pointing  upwards  like  the  people 
in  the  yard. 

But  my  godfather  could  not  see  it,  and  I  could 
not  show  it  him  because  I  could  not  see  it  myself, 
and  merely  affirmed  its  presence  there  on  the  au- 
thority of  others. 

"And  you,   Madame  Noziere,   can  you  see  the 
papagay?"  asked  my  godfather. 
"The  papagay?" 
"The  papagay  or  the  papegaut?" 
"The  papagay?" 

"The  papagay,"  repeated  by  godfather  laughing. 
163 


1 64  LITTLE  PIERRE 

His  laughter  sounded  like  little  rippling  bells  and 
made  his  braces  tinkle  on  his  green  silk  waistcoat. 
His  gaiety  was  infectious,  and  I  kept  on  laughing 
and  repeating,  without  knowing  what  I  was  saying: 

"The  papagay,  the  papagay!" 

But  my  dear  mamma,  being  of  a  prudent  disposi- 
tion, forbore  to  smile  until  my  father  informed  her 
that  the  old  name  for  the  parrot  was  papagay  or 
popingay. 

"Gay  as  a  papagay,  as  Rabelais  says,"  said  my 
godfather,  by  way  of  illustration. 

At  the  name  of  Rabelais,  which  I  then  heard  for 
the  first  time,  I  burst  into  fits  of  laughter,  I  don't 
know  why — stupidity,  silliness,  tomfoolery,  I  sup- 
pose, for  it  certainly  was  not  from  any  presentiment, 
intuition,  or  revelation  of  the  sublime  buffoonery,  the 
merry  whimsicality,  the  folly  wiser  than  wisdom,  that 
lies  concealed  beneath  that  name.  Nevertheless,  it 
cannot  be  gainsaid  that  it  was  a  becoming  manner  in 
which  to  salute  the  creator  of  Gargantua.  My  dear 
mamma  signed  to  me  to  hold  my  noise,  and  asked 
if  there  were  any  real  grounds  for  saying  that  par- 
rots were  gay. 

"Madame  Noziere,"  my  godfather  made  reply, 
"Papagay  rhymes  with  gay.  That  is  itself  reason 
enough  for  the  common  run  of  men,  who  attach 
more  importance  to  the  sound  of  a  word  than  they 
do  to  its  meaning.  Moreover,  one  may  reasonably 
suppose  that  a  parrot  is  pleased  to  see  himself  ar- 


LITTLE  PIERRE  165 

rayed  in  such  a  smart  green  dress.  Is  not  the  green 
of  a  parrot's  feathers  usually  called  'gay'  green?" 

In  the  neighbourhood  of  my  fifth  year  I  had  had 
some  little  differences  with  Madame  Laroque's  par- 
rot, Navarino ;  that  I  had  not  yet  forgotten.  He  had 
bitten  my  finger,  and  I  had  thought  seriously  about 
giving  him  a  dose  of  poison.  We  had  made  up  our 
quarrel,  but  I  wasn't  drawn  to  parrots.  I  had 
learnt  about  their  ways  from  a  little  book  called 
"Ernestine's  Aviary,"  which  I  had  had  for  a  New 
Year's  gift,  and  which  dealt  with  all  the  birds  in  the 
space  of  a  few  pages.  Anxiety  to  shine  in  conversa- 
tion led  me  to  say,  on  the  authority  of  my  book,  that 
the  savage  tribes  of  America  feed  on  parrots. 

"Its  flesh  must  be  dark  and  tough,"  objected  my 
godfather.  "I  have  never  heard  that  it  was  fit  to 
cat." 

"What,  Danquin,"  said  my  father.  'Don't  you 
remember  the  story  about  the  Princess  de  Joinville 
when  she  first  came  to  the  Tuileries  from  her  home 
in  the  Wild  West?  She  had  a  cold  and  refused 
chicken  broth,  demanding  parrot  broth  instead." 

My  father  had  been  hostile  to  the  July  Govern- 
ment, and  even  now,  after  the  revolution  of  '48, 
still  retained  a  feeling  of  animosity  towards  Louis 
Philippe's  family.  It  was,  therefore,  with  a  spice 
of  malice  that  he  launched  this  shaft,  glancing  the 
while  at  my  mother,  who  was  rather  inclined  to  pity 
the  lot  of  exiled  princesses. 


166  LITTLE  PIERRE 

"Poor  princesses,"  sighed  she,  "they  pay  dearly 
for  the  public  honours  accorded  them. 

All  of  a  sudden  I  caught  sight  of  the  parrot  in 
the  gutter.  I  uttered  a  yell  of  triumph  so  savage 
that  my  mother  was  at  first  horrified,  and  then 
angry. 

"There  it  is,  mamma,  look!  there!  there!" 

"Do  you  know  'Greenie-Green,'  Madame  No- 
ziere?"  asked  my  godfather. 

My  mother  shook  her  head. 

"What,  you  don't  know  'Greenie-Green?'  Well, 
you've  missed  something." 

"There's  no  time  for  reading,  Monsieur  Danquin, 
when  you've  got  a  child  belonging  to  you  that  wears 
out  his  knickerbockers  as  if  by  magic.  It's  a  piece  of 
poetry,  I  suppose?" 

"It  is,  Madame  Noziere,  and  a  very  charming 
piece  too." 

"At  Nevers,  then,  in  a  convent  cell 
A  famous  parrot  once  did  dwell. 
His  plumage  was  bright  and  fair  to  see, 
And  his  manners  were  gentle  and  frank  and  free 
As  the  ways  of  the  young  are  wont  to  be." 

The  nuns  loved  him  to  distraction : 

"They  petted  him  more,  so  I  have  heard, 
Than  if  he  had  been  the  king's  own  bird." 

And  then  at  night: 

He'd   roost   so   snug  on   the   Agnus  box. 

Greenie-Green  used  to  talk  like  an  angel.  But — " 
and  there  my  godfather  stopped  short. 


LITTLE  PIERRE  167 

"But  what?"  I  asked. 

My  father  at  this  juncture  very  properly  remarked 
that  I  did  not  speak  like  an  angel. 

"But,"  my  godfather  went  on,  "he  went  away 
cruising  on  the  Loire  with  bargees  and  musketeers, 
and  his  language  suffered  in  consequence." 

"You  see,"  said  my  mother,  pointing  the  moral, 
"how  evil  communications  corrupt  good  manners." 

"God-papa,  is  he  dead — Greenie-Green?"  I  asked. 

My  godfather  put  on  a  most  dismal  countenance, 
and  said  in  a  psalm-droning  voice: 

"He  died  from  eating  too  many  sweets.  Let  him 
be  a  warning  to  greedy  little  children." 

•And  my  godfather  gazing  out  on  the  court,  which 
was  all  gold  in  the  sunlight,  smiled  a  melancholy 
smile. 

"What  radiant  weather,"  said  he.  "The  last 
bright  days  seem  always  the  sorest  to  part  with." 

"They  seem  like  a  boon  from  heaven,"  said  my 
mother.  "The  cold  and  dark  days  will  soon  be 
here  now.  This  afternoon  old  Debas  is  coming  to 
sweep  the  dining-room  chimney."  And  thereupon 
she  went  off  to  her  bedroom. 

I  can  vividly  remember  the  most  trifling  circum- 
stances connected  with  the  memorable  events  of  that 
day. 

My  mother  reappeared  with  her  velvet  bonnet 
tied  under  her  chin,  her  mantle  of  puce-coloured  silk, 
and  her  umbrella  with  the  folding  handle. 


168  LITTLE  PIERRE 

From  her  preoccupied  and  pensive  air,  I  guessed 
that  she  was  going  out  to  do  some  winter  shopping 
and  that  she  was  wondering  how  to  lay  out  her 
money  to  the  best  advantage,  for  she  thought  a  lot 
of  her  money,  not  for  its  own  sake,  but  because  her 
husband  had  to  work  so  hard  to  get  it.  She  bent 
down  her  dear  face  which  her  bonnet  enshrined  as 
though  in  a  velvet  jewel-case,  kissed  me  on  the  fore- 
head, told  me  to  get  on  with  my  lessons,  reminded 
Melanie  to  open  a  bottle  of  wine  for  M.  Debas,  and 
went  out.  My  father  and  my  godfather  left  the 
house  almost  immediately  after. 

And  so  I  was  all  by  myself.  But,  as  usual,  I  did 
not  learn  my  lesson,  being  led  away  by  instinct  and 
the  inspiration  of  the  potent  spirit  which  governed 
the  workings  of  my  mind.  It  prompted  me  not  to 
learn  my  lessons,  and  indeed  deprived  me  of  all 
opportunity  of  so  doing  by  continually  imposing  upon 
me  other  arduous  tasks  amazing  in  their  diversity. 

That  afternoon  it  suggested  in  a  manner  not  to 
be  denied  that  I  should  look  out  of  the  window  and 
watch  for  the  truant  parrot.  But  it  was  in  vam 
that  I  kept  staring  up  at  the  roofs  and  the  chimney- 
tops.  The  parrot  was  nowhere  to  be  seen.  I  was 
beginning  to  yawn  with  weariness  when  I  suddenly 
heard  rather  a  loud  noise  behind  me,  and  turning 
round  beheld  M.  Debas.  He  had  a  bucket  on  his 
head,  and  was  carrying  a  ladder,  a  jug,  a  grappling 
hook,  some  rope,  and  heaven  knows  what  besides. 


LITTLE  PIERRE  169 

It  must  not  be  inferred  therefrom  that  M.  Debas 
was  a  mason  or  a  plumber.  In  point  of  fact,  he  was 
a  secondhand  bookseller,  who  displayed  his  wares 
in  boxes  on  the  parapet  of  the  Quai  Voltaire.  My 
mother  had  nicknamed  him  Simon  de  Nantua  after 
a  pedlar  about  whom  she  used  to  make  me  read  in 
a  little  book  that  no  one  hears  about  nowadays. 
Simon  de  Nantua  used  to  go  up  and  down  the  coun- 
try visiting  all  the  fairs.  He  bore  a  canvas  pack  on 
his  back  and  indulged  in  endless  moralizings.  He 
was  always  in  the  right.  His  story  bored  me  cruelly, 
and  left  a  most  dismal  impression  on  my  memory, 
but,  nevertheless,  it  was  instrumental  in  enabling  me 
to  recognize  one  important  truth,  and  that  is  that 
it  does  not  do  to  be  always  in  the  right.  M.  Debas, 
like  Simon  de  Nantua,  moralized  from  morning  till 
night,  and  occupied  himself  with  everything  save 
his  own  business.  Always  ready  to  oblige  his  neigh- 
bours, and  to  do  odd  jobs  for  all  and  sundry,  he 
would  put  up  or  take  down  stoves,  rivet  broken 
crockery,  fit  new  handles  to  knives,  see  to  the  bells, 
grease  the  locks,  regulate  timepieces,  help  people  to 
move  out  or  to  move  in,  give  first  aid  to  folk  rescued 
from  drowning,  fix  draught  excluders  to  windows 
and  doors,  hold  forth  at  the  wine  merchant's  in  fa- 
vour of  constituted  authority,  and  sing  of  a  Sunday 
in  the  chapel  of  the  Little  Sisters  of  the  Poor.  My 
mother  looked  upon  him  as  a  good  man  who  was 
superior  to  his  station  in  life.  As  for  me,  I  should 


170  LITTLE  PIERRE 

have  found  it  difficult  to  put  up  with  the  everlasting 
sermons  on  seemliness  and  good  behaviour  with 
which  M.  Debas  was  continually  plaguing  me,  had 
it  not  been  that  he  amused  me  enormously  with  an 
excessive  ardour  for  work,  a  trait  of  which  I  was 
the  only  person  in  the  world  to  see  the  comic  side. 
Whenever  I  saw  him,  I  always  counted  on  being 
entertained  by  some  amazing  piece  of  excitement. 
Nor  on  this  occasion  were  my  expectations  falsified. 
Our  dining-room  stove  was  of  white  earthenware, 
cracked  and  split  in  various  places.  It  stood  in  a 
recess  in  a  corner  of  the  room.  It  was  fitted  with 
a  pipe,  likewise  of  earthenware,  surmounted  by  the 
head  of  a  bearded  man,  which,  because  I  had  heard 
the  information  given  to  M.  Debas,  I  knew  to  be 
that  of  Jupiter  Trophonius.  And  the  beard  of  so 
august  a  deity  duly  impressed  me.  M.  Debas  put 
on  a  white  overall  and  mounted  the  steps.  And 
lol  in  a  trice,  Jupiter  Trophonius  was  lying  on  the 
floor,  and  from  the  column  from  which  he  had 
been  dismounted  the  soot  was  pouring  in  volumes. 
The  stove  itself,  now  taken  to  pieces,  was  strewn  in 
little  bits  all  over  the  floor,  and  clouds  of  ashes 
darkened  the  air.  The  gloom  was  still  further  in- 
tensified by  an  impalpable  powder  which  ascended 
to  the  ceiling,  and  slowly  descended  again  to  settle 
in  a  thick  layer  on  the  furniture  and  the  carpet. 
M.  Debas  was  mixing  mortar  which  was  running 
all  over  the  side  of  his  bucket.  It  was  quite  evident 


LITTLE  PIERRE  171 

that  he  enjoyed  labouring  after  the  manner  of  the 
god  who  wrought  order  out  of  chaos.  At  this 
juncture  Melanie  came  in,  her  basket  on  her  arm. 
She  gazed  from  wall  to  wall,  and  from  ceiling  to 
floor  in  dismay,  and  with  a  deep  sigh  exclaimed: 

"How  in  the  world  am  I  going  to  lay  dinner  in 
here?" 

Then,  apparently  despairing  of  a  satisfactory 
reply,  she  went  out  to  get  on  with  her  shopping. 

Chaos  was  still  reigning  when  suddenly  there  was 
a  fresh  outbreak  of  excitement  in  the  courtyard. 
M.  Bellaguet's  coachman,  old  Alexandre,  our  con- 
cierge, the  Caumont's  servant  and  young  Alphonse, 
all  began  to  shout  at  once: 

"There  it  is.     I  see  it.     There  it  is!" 

This  time  I  caught  sight  of  it  right  enough.  There, 
on  the  top  of  the  roof,  was  the  Comtesse  Michaud's 
parrot.  It  was  green,  with  a  splash  of  red  on  the 
wings.  But  scarcely  had  it  shown  itself  when  it 
disappeared  again. 

The  people  in  the  court  were  arguing  about  the 
direction  it  had  taken.  One  thought  it  had  flown 
towards  M.  Bellaguet's  garden,  the  idea  being  that 
it  would  be  reminded  of  the  Brazilian  forests  in 
which  it  had  spent  its  early  days.  Another  swore  it 
had  made  for  the  quay,  so  that  it  could  cast  itself 
into  the  riven  The  concierge  had  seen  it  perch  on 
the  tower  of  Saint-Germain-des-Pres.  But  the  old 
concierge  had  served  under  Napoleon,  and  his  recol- 


172  LITTLE  PIERRE 

lection  of  the  eagle  with  the  national  colours  had 
evidently  acted  upon  his  imagination.  The  Com- 
tesse  Michaud's  parrot  was  not  flying  from  one 
church  tower  to  another.  M.  Caumont's  clerk  con- 
jectured with  greater  probability  that,  driven  by 
stress  of  hunger,  the  fugitive  was  making  for  the 
roof  that  concealed  its  food  supply.  Simon  de  Nan- 
tua,  leaning  against  the  window,  was  lending  a 
thoughtful  ear  to  what  was  passing.  In  order  to 
display  my  knowledge,  I  remarked  to  him  that  this 
parrot  was  not  such  a  fine  one  as  Greenie-Green. 

"Greenie-Green,  what  do  you  call  Greenie-Green?" 
said  he. 

My  bosom  swelled  with  pride  as  I  informed  him 
that  Greenie-Green  was  a  parrot  belonging  to  the 
Visitandines  of  Nevers,  which  used  to  speak  like 
an  angel,  but  which  had  got  to  use  bad  language 
after  travelling  up  and  down  the  Loire  in  the  com- 
pany of  bargees  and  musketeers.  As  soon  as  I  had 
said  it,  I  realized  that  it  is  a  mistake  to  air  one's 
knowledge  to  the  ignorant,  for  Simon  de  Nahtua, 
having  glared  at  me  severely  with  a  pair  of  big  eyes 
about  as  expressive  as  lamp  globes,  rebuked  me  for 
talking  rubbish. 

Meanwhile,  he  was  revolving  deep  thoughts  with- 
in his  breast. 

Among  the  countless  services  that  his  kindness  of 
heart  prompted  him  to  render  his  neighbours,  the 
one  which  he  loved  best  to  perform  was  that  of  re- 


LITTLE  PIERRE  173 

capturing  escaped  birds.  For  example,  he  had  often 
brought  back  Madame  Caumont's  canaries.  He 
deemed  that  to  restore  her  parrot  to  the  Comtesse 
Michaud  was  his  bounden  duty,  and  he  did  not  hesi- 
tate to  take  steps  to  accomplish  it.  Having  hastily 
replaced  his  white  overall  by  an  old  green  frock-coat 
which  was  turning  yellow  like  the  autumn  leaves,  he 
acquainted  me  with  his  intention,  and,  leaving  the 
dining-room  in  the  chaotic  condition  which  he  had 
not  had  time  to  reduce  to  order,  he  went  out,  his 
head  full  of  his  scheme.  I  tore  after  him  down 
the  staircase.  At  a  bound  we  covered  the  short 
space  that  separated  us  from  the  house  I  knew  so 
well,  the  house  where  Morin  was  concierge,  the 
house  where  the  Comtesse  Michaud  lived.  We  flew 
upstairs  as  far  as  the  second  floor  landing,  found 
the  door  wide  open,  and  entered  to  behold  an  air 
of  desolation  over  all.  In  the  dining-room  we  saw 
the  deserted  perch.  Mathilde,  the  Countess's  lady's 
maid,  explained  the  circumstances  which  had  pre- 
ceded and  led  up  to  Jacquot's  flight.  The  day  be- 
fore, about  five  o'clock  in  the  afternoon,  a  grey  cat, 
with  short  fur,  an  enormous  great  torn,  whose  depre- 
dations had  long  since  earned  him  an  unfavourable 
reputation,  had  come  bounding  into  the  dining-room. 
At  the  sight  of  him  Jacquot,  in  terror,  had  flown 
out  on  to  the  landing,  and  escaped  through  the  sky- 
light. Twice  did  Mathilde  relate  this  story.  As 
she  was  about  to  repeat  it  a  third  time,  I  slipped 


174  LITTLE  PIERRE 

out  into  the  drawing-room  and  fell  to  gazing  at  the 
full  length  portrait  of  General  Comte  Michaud 
which  occupied  the  principal  panel.  As  I  have 
already  mentioned,  the  General  was  depicted  in  full 
dress,  white  breeches  and  patent  leather  boots,  at 
the  battle  of  Wagram.  At  his  feet  were  fragments 
of  shell,  a  cannon  ball,  a  smoking  grenade.  In  {he 
background  soldiers,  quite  small  by  reason  of  their 
being  so  far  off,  were  charging.  On  his  broad  chest 
the  General  wore  the  ribbon  of  the  Grand  Eagle 
of  the  Legion  of  Honour,  and  the  Cross  of  St. 
Louis.  I  saw  no  incongruity  in  his  wearing  the 
Cross  of  St.  Louis  at  Wagram.  I  should  have 
done,  when  I  saw  the  picture  at  a  dealer's  some  years 
later,  if  I  had  not  been  told  that  General  Comte 
Michaud,  having  been  overwhelmed  with  favours 
and  distinctions  by  the  Bourbons  had,  in  1816,  caused 
the  cross  to  be  added  to  his  portrait.  Simon  de 
Nantua  aroused  me  from  my  reverie,  and  informed 
me  that  people  did  not  go  into  drawing-rooms  with- 
out being  asked  and  without  first  wiping  their  feet. 
His  reprimand  was  brief,  for  time  was  precious. 

"Come  on!"  he  said. 

And  armed  with  a  thick  rope,  from  which  ap- 
parently he  intended  to  suspend  himself  in  mid  air, 
he  mounted  the  staircase.  I  followed  carrying  a 
glass  which  he  had  given  into  my  charge,  and  which 
contained  some  bread  soaked  in  wine  as  a  bait  for 
Jacquot.  My  heart  beat  violently  at  the  thought 


LITTLE  PIERRE  175 

of  the  dangers  into  which  this  expedition  was  about 
to  plunge  me.  Never  in  their  most  thrilling  adven- 
tures of  warfare  or  the  chase  did  the  trappers  of 
Arkansas,  the  filibusters  of  South  America,  or  the 
buccaneers  of  St.  Domingo,  feel  more  keenly  than  I 
the  intoxication  of  peril.  We  mounted  the  stair- 
case as  far  as  it  went,  then  we  began  on  one  of  the 
steepest  of  steep  ladders,  up  which  we  struggled  as 
far  as  a  skylight,  through  which  Simon  de  Nantua 
thrust  one  half  of  his  body.  I  could  now  only  see 
his  legs  and  his  enormous  posterior.  First  he  called 
Jacquot  in  wheedling  tones,  then  he  imitated  Jac- 
quot's  raucous  notes  in  case,  I  take  it,  the  bird  pre- 
ferred the  sound  of  his  own  organ  to  the  speech  of 
man.  Now  he  whistled,  now  he  sang  like  a  siren, 
interrupting  his  incantations  from  time  to  time  to 
impart  to  me  precepts  in  matters  ranging  from  eti- 
quette to  ethics,  and  to  instruct  me  how  to  blow  my 
nose  in  company,  and  how  to  comport  myself  to- 
wards the  powers  that  be. 

The  hours  went  by.  As  the  sun  declined^  the 
shadows  of  the  chimneys  along  the  roofs  grew  longer 
and  longer.  We  were  just  beginning  to  despair, 
when  Jacquot  hove  in  sight.  The  forecast  of  M. 
Caumont's  clerk  was  in  a  fair  way  to  being  brought 
to  pass.  I  thrust  my  head  through  the  skylight,  and 
saw  the  parrot.  He  was  coming  along  with  diffi- 
culty, balancing  his  bulky  body,  and  slowly  and  gin- 
gerly descending  the  sloping  roof  of  the  gable.  It 


176  LITTLE  PIERRE 

was  he  right  enough,  and  he  was  making  his  way 
towards  me.  I  could  not  keep  still  for  joy.  He 
was  now  quite  close  up.  I  did  not  dare  to  breathe. 
Simon  de  Nantua  hailed  him  in  rousing  tones,  and, 
taking  the  piece  of  bread  soaked  in  wine,  put  it 
on  to  his  closed  fist  and  held  it  out  to  him  at  arm's 
length.  Jacquot  stopped  short,  darted  a  mistrustful 
glance  in  our  direction,  turned  back,  flapped  his 
wings,  and  flew  away.  At  first  his  flight  was  la- 
boured, but  gradually  it  grew  more  rapid  and  sus- 
tained, and,  at  length,  carried  him  as  far  as  the 
roof  of  a  neighbouring  house,  where  he  disappeared 
from  view.  The  discomfiture  of  both  of  us  was 
great,  but  Simon  de  Nantua  was  not  going  to  let 
himself  be  beaten  by  a  bit  of  bad  luck.  He  stretched 
forth  his  arm  towards  the  ocean  of  roofs. 

"After  him!"  he  cried. 

This  masterful  gesture,  this  short,  sharp  utterance 
carried  me  away.  I  hung  on  to  his  old  frock-coat 
and,  to  relate  the  facts  as  they  present  themselves 
to  my  recollection,  I  clove  the  air  with  him  and  de- 
scended from  the  cloudy  heights  into  an  unknown 
enclosure  wherein  there  rose  up  facades  of  carved 
stone.  And  I  beheld  a  multitude  of  naked  men; 
huge,  terrifying  figures,  floating  in  a  sunless  sky. 
Some  were  upstaying  there  the  weight  of  their 
mighty  frames,  others  were  falling  in  desperate 
headlong  flight  towards  the  dark  verge  where 
hideous  demons  were  waiting  to  seize  them.  This 


LITTLE  PIERRE  177 

vision  filled  me  with  a  sort  of  religious  terror.  My 
sight  grew  dim,  my  legs  gave  way  beneath  me.  Such 
are  the  facts  as  they  appeared  to  my  senses 
and  my  understanding  and  as  they  remain  graven 
on  my  memory,  and  faithful  is  the  account  of  them 
I  have  here  set  down.  Howbeit,  if  these  facts  are 
to  be  subjected  to  the  laws  of  the  higher  criticism 
I  must  add  that  we,  Simon  *de  Nantua  and  I,  had 
apparently  descended  the  staircase  with  lightning 
rapidity,  run  along  the  quay,  turned  down  the  Rue 
Bonaparte  and  come  to  the  £cole  des  Beaux-Arts 
where,  through  a  half-open  door,  I  caught  sight  of 
a  copy  of  Michael  Angelo's  "Last  Judgment" 
painted  by  Sigalon.  This  is  only  a  hypothesis,  but 
it  is  a  likely  one.  And  now,  without  further  com- 
mitting ourselves  to  anything  definite  on  this  point, 
let  us  continue  our  narrative.  I  had  only  a  moment 
to  contemplate  the  floating  giants,  when  I  found  my- 
self, with  Simon  de  Nantua  at  my  side,  in  a  spacious 
quadrangle  around  which  were  to  be  seen  beadles  in 
cocked  hats,  and  young  men  with  long  hair  shadowed 
by  wide-brimmed  felts  a  la  Rubens,  and  carrying 
portfolios  under  their  arms.  The  beadles  said  they 
had  seen  nothing  of  the  Comtesse  Michaud's  parrot. 
The  young  men  jocularly  told  Simon  de  Nantua  to 
put  some  salt  on  its  tail  if  he  wanted  to  catch  it,  or, 
better  still,  to  scratch  its  head.  They  swore  that 
there  was  nothing  parrots  liked  better.  And  with  a 


178  LITTLE  PIERRE 

bow  the  young  men  begged  us  to  present  their  com- 
pliments to  the  Comtesse  Michaud. 

"Saucy  young  cubs !"  said  Simon  de  Nantua,  and 
he  quitted  the  place  in  a  huff. 

Returning  to  the  Comtesse  Michaud's,  we  went 
into  the  dining-room,  and  found — what  do  you  sup- 
pose? The  parrot  himself  back  on  his  perch.  He 
was  riding  it  with  an  unruffled,  easy-going  air,  and 
looked  as  though  he  had  never  left  it.  A  few  grains 
of  hempseed  that  lay  scattered  about  the  floor  bore 
witness  to  the  fact  that  he  had  just  had  a  meal.  At 
our  approach,  he  turned  on  us  an  eye  that  was  as 
round  and  defiant  as  a  cockade,  swung  to  and  fro  on 
his  perch,  ruffled  his  feathers,  and  opened  wide  the 
beak  whose  curve  determined  the  outline  of  his  whole 
countenance.  An  old  lady,  wearing  a  black  lace 
cap,  her  thin  cheeks  framed  in  white  curls,  doubt- 
less the  Comtesse  Michaud,  was  seated  near  Jacquot. 
At  the  sight  of  us  she  looked  the  other  way.  The 
lady's  maid  went  in  and  out  of  the  room  without 
vouchsafing  a  word.  Simon  de  Nantua  kept  fiddling 
about  with  his  hat,  holding  it  first  in  one  hand,  then 
in  the  other.  He  pretended  to  smile,  but  only 
looked  silly.  At  last  Mathilde  informed  us,  with- 
out deigning  to  cast  a  look  in  our  direction,  that 
Jacquot  had  just  returned  of  his  own  accord,  having 
come  in  through  the  skylight  in  the  attic  where  she 
slept,  and  which  the  dear  creature  knew  so  well  from 


LITTLE  PIERRE  179 

having  so  often  been  carried  thither  on  his  Mathilde's 
shoulder. 

"He  would  have  come  back  all  the  sooner,"  she 
added  sourly,  "if  you  hadn't  frightened  him  away." 

They  did  not  ask  us  to  stay,  and,  as  Simon  de  Nan- 
tua  ruefully  remarked  to  me  as  we  were  going  down 
the  stairs,  they  did  not  so  much  as  offer  us  a  little 
refreshment. 

It  was  getting  dark  when  I  returned  home.  I 
found  the  whole  household  in  a  state  of  consterna- 
tion; my  mother  was  feverishly  excited,  old  Mela'nie 
in  tears,  my  father  doing  his  best  to  appear  calm. 
They  thought  I  had  been  kidnapped  by  gipsies  or 
travelling  circus  folk,  or  taken  up  by  the  police  out- 
side some  shop  with  a  crowd  of  hooligans,  or  at 
the  very  least  that  I  was  lost  and  wandering  about 
in  some  far-off  maze  of  streets.  They  had  been  to 
find  out  whether  I  was  at  Madame  Caumont's,  or 
at  the  Laroques'  or  at  Madame  Letord's,  the  print- 
seller's.  They  had  even  gone  to  M.  Clerot's,  the 
mapseller's,  where  I  sometimes  liked  to  wander  to 
contemplate  a  globe  representing  this  earth,  whereon 
I  deemed  that  I  occupied  no  unimportant  place.  They 
were  just  thinking,  when  I  rang  the  bell,  of  going  off 
to  notify  the  police.  My  mother  looked  at  me  very 
carefully  all  over,  touched  my  forehead  and  found 
it  moist,  ran  her  fingers  through  my  tangled  hair 
that  was  full  of  cobwebs,  and  said, 

"But  where  have  you  been,  to  come  home  in  such 


i8o  LITTLE  PIERRE 

a  state,  without  your  hat,  and  a  great  hole  in  the 
knee  of  your  knickerbockers?" 

I  recounted  my  adventure,  and  how  I  had  gone 
with  Simon  de  Nantua  to  look  for  the  parrot. 

"Well,"  she  cried.  "I  should  never  have  thought 
M.  Debas  would  dare  to  keep  the  child  out  the  whole 
afternoon  without  my  permission  and  without  let- 
ting anyone  know." 

"You  must  put  it  down  to  his  ignorance  I" 
said  old  Melanie,  with  a  toss  of  her  head.  Melanie 
was  a  good  soul,  but  being  humble  and  lowly  she  was 
inclined  to  be  down  on  her  own  class. 

Dinner  was  served  in  the  drawing-room,  the 
dining-room  being  totally  out  of  the  question. 

"Pierre,"  said  my  father,  when  I  had  finished  my 
soup,  "how  was  it  you  did  not  realize  how  terribly 
anxious  your  mother  would  be  at  your  being  out  all 
that  long  time?" 

I  had  to  undergo  a  little  more  scolding,  but,  obvi- 
ously, it  was  Simon  de  Nantua  who  was  regarded  as 
the  chief  culprit. 

My  mother  kept  asking  me  about  my  climbing  ad- 
ventures, and  seemed  unable  to  shake  off  her  terror 
at  the  dangers  I  had  been  through. 

I  answered  her  that  I  had  not  been  in  any  danger. 
I  tried  to  calm  her,  but,  at  the  same  time,  I  was 
anxious  to  give  proof  of  my  powers  and  courage, 
and,  while  I  kept  repeating  that  I  had  been  careful 
to  run  no  risk,  I  represented  myself  as  mounting 


LITTLE  PIERRE  181 

ladders  suspended  in  space,  scaling  walls,  clambering 
over  precipitous  roofs,  and  careering  along  gutters. 
At  first,  as  she  listened  to  my  tale,  a  slight  tremulous- 
ness  of  the  lips  betrayed  her  emotion.  Then,  gradu- 
ally recovering  her  serenity,  she  tossed  her  head  and 
finally  burst  out  laughing  in  my  face.  I  had  over- 
done it.  And,  when  I  told  her  how  I  had  seen  a 
host  of  enormous  naked  men  suspended  in  mid-air, 
they  put  on  the  closure  and  sent  me  to  bed. 

The  adventure  of  the  parrot  became  famous  in 
our  family  and  among  our  friends.  My  dear  mamma 
used  to  tell,  not  perhaps  without  a  touch  of  motherly 
pride,  how  I  had  raced  along  the  house  tops  in  com- 
pany with  M.  Debas,  whom  she  never  forgave.  My 
godfather  used  to  dub  me  ironically  "the  parrot 
hunter;"  M.  Dubois  himself,  notwithstanding  his 
habitually  grave  demeanour,  almost  smiled  as  he 
listened  to  so  strange  a  story,  and  remarked  that 
with  his  green  coat,  his  big  head,  his  short  thick 
neck,  his  wide  chest,  squat  figure  and  grim  aspect, 
the  warlike  parrot  on  his  perch  offers  a  pretty  close 
likeness  to  Napoleon  on  board  the  Northumberland. 
And  M.  Marc  Ribert  too,  when  he  heard  this  story, 
M.  Marc  Ribert,  the  long-haired  romanticist  whose 
clothes  were  of  velvet,  and  who  was  given  to  dally- 
ing with  the  Muses,  would  begin  to  murmur: 

"In  the  springtime,  pretty  ring  time, 

There  is  naught  so  gay,  I  ween, 
As  the  plumage  of  the  parrot 

Blue,  grey,  yellow,  red  and  green." 


CHAPTER  XXII 

UNCLE    HYACINTHE 

NE  day  when  I  went  into  the  draw- 
ingroom,  I  was  very  much  taken 
aback  to  find  my  mother  in  con- 
versation with  a  rather  fine-looking 
old  man,  whom  I  had  never  seen  be- 
fore. His  bare  pate,  encircled  with 
a  coronal  of  silver  hairs,  was  pink  in  hue.  His  com- 
plexion was  clear,  his  eyes  blue,  and  a  smile  hovered 
about  his  lips.  He  looked  spruce  and  well  shaven, 
and  a  pair  of  mutton-chop  whiskers  befringed  his 
chubby  cheeks.  He  was  wearing  a  bunch  of  violets 
in  the  buttonhole  of  his  great  coat. 

"Is  this  your  little  chap,  Antoinette?"  he  asked 
when  he  saw  me.  "You'd  take  him  for  a  girl,  he 
looks  so  soft  and  shy.  You  must  give  him  plenty  of 
plum  pudding  if  you're  going  to  make  a  man  of 
him." 

He  signed  to  me  to  draw  near,  and  laid  his  hand 
on  my  shoulder 

"Little  man,"  he  began,  "you're  just  at  the  age 
when  life  seems  all  smiles  and  caresses.  One  day 
you'll  find  out  that  life  is  often  hard  and  occasionally 

unjust  and  cruel.     For  your  sake  I  hope  you  won't 

182 


LITTLE  PIERRE  183 

have  to  learn  the  lesson  in  too  harsh  a  school.  But 
let  me  tell  you  this,  and  never  forget  it,  that  a  stout 
heart  and  a  clear  conscience  will  bring  you  through 
anything." 

Honesty  and  kindness  seemed  to  beam  in  his 
face.  His  voice  went  straight  to  your  heart.  It 
was  impossible  not  to  be  moved  as  he  looked  at  you 
with  eyes  that  melted  as  he  spoke. 

"M on  enfant,"  he  went  on,  "Fortune  has  blessed 
you  with  excellent  parents  who,  when  the  time  comes, 
will  give  you  their  guidance  in  the  difficult  task  of 
choosing  a  career.  Wouldn't  you  like  to  be  a  sol- 
dier?" 

My  mother  answered  for  me,  and  said  she  didn't 
think  so. 

"It's  a  fine  calling,  though,"  the  old  fellow  rattled 
on.  "One  day,  without  food  and  without  shelter, 
the  soldier  flings  himself  down  like  a  beggar  on  a 
bed  of  straw,  the  next  night  he  sups  in  a  palace,  and 
the  highest  ladies  in  the  land  deem  it  an  honour 
to  wait  on  him.  He  is  familiar  with  every  change 
of  fortune,  with  every  mode  of  life.  But  if  ever 
you  should  have  the  honour  to  wear  a  soldier's  uni- 
form, remember,  my  son,  that  it  is  a  soldier's  duty 
to  protect  the  widow  and  the  orphan,  and  to  spare 
the  vanquished  foe.  He  who  speaks  these  words 
to  you  bore  arms  under  Napoleon  the  Great.  Alas, 
more  than  thirty  years  have  now  rolled  by  since  the 
god  of  battles  quitted  this  earth,  and  now  that  he 


1 84  LITTLE  PIERRE 

is  gone  there  is  no  one  left  to  rally  our  eagles  to 
the  conquest  of  the  world.  Ah,  my  son,  don't  be  a 
soldier." 

He  pushed  me  gently  from  him,  and,  turning  to 
my  mother,  resumed  the  conversation  which  my  ap- 
pearance had  interrupted. 

"Oh,  yes,  yes,  just  a  modest  little  place;  something 
after  the  style  of  a  gamekeeper's  cottage.  Well, 
then,  it's  settled,  and,  thanks  to  you,  my  dear  An- 
toinette I  shall  be  able  to  have  what  I  have  always 
longed  for.  After  all  the  disappointments  and  the 
ups  and  downs  of  life  I  shall  taste  the  delights  of 
repose.  I  require  so  little  to  live  on.  I  have  always 
hoped  that  I  should  be  able  to  end  my  days  in  the 
peace  of  the  country." 

He  rose,  kissed  my  mother's  hand  with  a  gallant 
air,  nodded  affectionately  at  me,  and  took  his  depar- 
ture. His  mien  was  noble  and  his  step  was  firm. 

I  was  much  surprised  when  I  learned  that  this 
amiable  old  gentleman  was  Uncle  Hyacinthe,  whom 
I  had  never  heard  mentioned  save  in  terms  of  horror 
and  reprobation,  who  brought  with  him  disaster  and 
despair  wherever  he  went,  when,  in  short,  I  heard 
that  he  was  indeed  that  same  Uncle  Hyacinthe  who 
was  the  terror  and  black  sheep  of  the  family.  My 
parents  had  refused  him  the  house;  but  Hyacinthe, 
after  ten  years'  silence,  had,  in  a  touching  letter,  just 
announced  to  my  mother  that  he  intended  retiring 
to  some  hamlet  in  his  native  county  if  she  would  pro- 


LITTLE  PIERRE  185 

vide  money  to  pay  his  fare  and  set  him  up  in  a  little 
home  of  his  own.  Once  there,  he  said,  he  could 
support  himself  by  managing  the  estates  of  a  foster 
brother  with  whom  he  had  always  remained  on  ex- 
cellent terms.  My  mother,  all  too  ready  to  believe 
his  tale,  and  deaf  to  my  father's  advice,  agreed  to 
lend  him  the  money. 

Some  little  time  afterwards  she  learnt  that,  having 
squandered  in  riotous  living  the  funds  received  by 
him  for  a  different  purpose,  he  had  got  a  job  as 
bookkeeper  and  accountant  at  the  establishment  of 
a  marchand  d'hommes  in  the  Rue  Saint-Honore. 
Such  was  the  name  given  to  those  who,  for  valuable 
consideration  provided  rich  young  men  anxious  to 
evade  military  service,  with  men  to  take  their  place. 
These  gentry  did  a  roaring  trade,  but  they  were  held 
in  scant  esteem,  and  members  of  their  staff  could 
hardly  aspire  to  be  greatly  looked  up  to.  They  con- 
gregated for  the  most  part  in  a  big  house  in  the 
Rue  Saint-Honore  at  the  corner  of  the  Rue  du 
Coq,  which  was  covered  from  top  to  bottom  with 
signs  adorned  with  croix  d'honneur  and  tricolour 
flags.  On  the  ground  floor  was  a  shop  where  they 
sold  second-hand  epaulettes  and  N.C.O.  stripes,  and 
a  bar  frequented  by  soldiers  who  had  completed  the 
seven  years'  service  required  of  them  by  the  State, 
and  desired  to  rejoin  the  colours.  Outside,  by  way 
of  signboard,  there  hung  a  picture  painted  on  a 
piece  of  sheet  iron,  representing  two  grenadiers 


1 86  LITTLE  PIERRE 

seated  at  a  table  in  an  arbour,  each  of  them  pulling 
the  stopper  from  his  jar  of  beer  with  so  free  and 
lucky  a  sweep  of  the  arm  that  each  jet  of  the  foam- 
ing liquor,  after  describing  a  bold  curve  in  the  air, 
descended  neatly  into  his  comrade's  glass.  It  was 
there,  I  am  afraid,  behind  a  pair  of  frowsy  curtains, 
that  Uncle  Hyacinthe  busied  himself  with  his  new 
duties,  which  consisted  in  making  the  discharged 
soldiers  gamble  and  drink  so  as  to  render  them  care- 
less as  to  the  price  of  their  re-engagement  Perhaps, 
when  I  passed  by  this  house  in  the  Rue  Saint-Honore, 
it  was  the  gaiety  of  the  sign  that  helped  me  to  bear 
with  equanimity  the  sight  of  the  dram  shop  in  which 
the  good  name  of  the  family  was  being  dragged  in 
the  mire. 

Hyacinthe  who,  albeit  no  scholar,  was  good  at 
figures  and  a  quick  reckoner  had,  what  used  to  be 
called  in  those  days,  a  good  hand.  That  is  to  say 
he  was  a  skilful  penman.  One  conspicuous  example 
of  his  work  was  a  copy  of  Bonaparte's  proclamation 
to  the  troops  in  Italy.  It  was  written  in  microscopic 
characters,  and  the  lines  were  so  arranged  as  to 
form  a  portrait  of  the  First  Consul.  He  became  a 
conscript  in  1813,  and  was  promoted  to  the  rank  of 
adjutant  the  following  year,  during  the  campaign  in 
France.  He  used  to  boast  of  having  had  a  conver- 
sation with  the  Emperor  one  night,  when  the  army 
was  bivouacking  near  Craonne. 

"Sire,"  said  Hyacinthe,  "we  will  shed  our  last  drop 


LITTLE  PIERRE  187 

of  blood  under  your  leadership,  for  you  are  the 
living  symbol  of  Freedom  and  of  our  native  land." 

"Hyacinthe,"  replied  the  Emperor,  "you  have 
read  me  aright." 

Our  only  knowledge  of  this  interview,  let  me 
hasten  to  add,  is  derived  from  the  account  given  of 
it  by  Hyacinthe  himself,  who,  we  have  his  own  word 
for  it,  covered  himself  with  glory  next  day  at 
Craonne.  As  the  most  splendid  deeds  occasionally 
bring  about  the  most  undesirable  results,  it  came  to 
pass  that  Hyacinthe,  having  blossomed  out  into  a 
hero  in  the  space  of  a  few  moments,  considered  he 
had  earned  a  lifelong  emancipation  from  all  those 
rules  and  obligations  by  which  ordinary  folk  are  en- 
cumbered, and  thenceforward  respected  neither  God 
nor  man.  He  had  squandered  all  his  virtue  in  a 
single  day.  It  is  doubtful  whether  he  was  at  Water- 
loo, and  this  point  will  probably  never  be  settled. 
Even  at  this  early  stage  he  was  a  great  haunter  of 
taverns  and  would  rather  talk  about  his  exploits  than 
repeat  them.  When,  in  1815,  he  was  just  completing 
his  twenty-second  year,  he  got  his  discharge.  A  hand- 
some, strapping,  upstanding  blade,  he  was  the  darling 
of  the  sex  and  no  feminine  heart  was  p'roof  against 
his  blandishments.  He  was  beloved  by  one  of  my 
mother's  aunts,  a  well-to-do  yeoman's  daughter.  He 
consented  to  marry  her  and  played  ducks  and  drakes 
with  her  money.  By  betraying,  ill-treating  and  de- 
serting her  he  afforded  her  numerous  opportunities 


1 88  LITTLE  PIERRE 

of  proving  how  fervently  she  idolized,  how  madly 
she  loved  him.  Careful,  even  stingy,  with  her  money, 
she  would  simply  throw  it  away  where  he  was  con- 
cerned. He  might  have  been  seen  at  this  period, 
between  Paris  and  Pontoise,  wearing  a  grey  hat  with 
a  steel  buckle  and  a  very  broad  crown,  a  green  frock- 
coat  with  gold  buttons,  nankeen  breeches  and  patent 
leather  top  boots,  driving  a  two-wheeled  dog-cart, 
altogether  an  admirable  subject  for  a  picture  by 
Carle  Vernet.  Frequenting  the  Bazuf  a>  la  Mode 
and  the  Rocher  de  Cancale,  in  the  company  of  women 
of  the  town,  and  passing  his  nights  in  brothels  and 
gambling  dens,  it  only  took  him  a  few  years  to  get 
through  his  wife's  property — fields,  meadows,  woods, 
mill  and  all.  Having  reduced  the  poor  devoted 
thing  to  beggary,  he  abandoned  her,  to  go  off  on  a 
career  of  adventure  with  a  man  named  Huguet  who 
had  once  been  a  postmaster.  Huguet  was  an  ill- 
dressed,  bandy-legged,  dried-up  little  wisp  of  a  man 
whom  Hyacinthe  made  his  servant,  his  partner  and 
sometimes,  when  there  were  any  risks  to  be  run,  his 
employer.  Huguet  was  a  rogue  and  had  swindled 
people  right  and  left,  but  to  Hyacinthe  he  showed 
himself  the  most  faithful,  the  most  generous  and  the 
noblest  of  friends.  Huguet,  who  was  a  Royalist  and 
a  bit  of  a  firebrand,  and  who,  moreover,  had  brought 
the  White  Terror  into  Aveyron,  his  native  place, 
turned  Bonapartist  because  of  his  regard  for  his  be- 
loved Hyacinthe,  who  was  a  Bonapartist  because  it 


LITTLE  PIERRE  189 

paid  him.  Hyacinthe  dressed  for  the  part.  He  wore 
a  long  frock-coat  buttoned  up  to  the  chin,  a  bunch 
of  violets  in  his  buttonhole  and  carried  a  club 
in  his  hand.  On  the  Boulevard  de  Gand,  sur- 
rounded by  a  few  brothers  in  arms,  and  Huguet 
following  behind  like  a  spaniel,  he  used  to  anathema- 
tize England  for  keeping  Napoleon  in  captivity  and 
when  he  came  out  of  the  tavern  he  would  face  north- 
west and  pointing  an  avenging  finger  toward  la 
perfide  dlbion  denounce  her  monstrous  conduct. 
His  lips  moved  in  silent  prayer  for  the  advent  of  the 
Kingdom  of  the  Son  of  Man.  If  he  met  some  loyal 
subject  of  the  King  decorated  with  a  silver  lily  he 
would  give  an  inaudible  grunt  and  say,  "There  goes 
another  companion  of  Ulysses."  If  he  could  lay  hold 
of  a  dog  without  being  seen,  he  would  tie  a  white 
cockade  on  to  its  tail.  But  he  never  got  involved  in 
plots  or  conspiracies.  He  did  not  even  fight  duels. 
Uncle  Hyacinthe  was  like  Panurge.  He  had  a  natu- 
ral dislike  to  being  hit.  Huguet  supplied  the  pluck 
and  was  always  ready  for  a  set-to.  Being  reduced  to 
living  by  his  wits,  Hyacinthe  set  up  as  a  professor 
of  writing  and  bookkeeping  in  the  Rue  Montmatre. 
Huguet  scrubbed  the  floor  and  grilled  the  sausages, 
and  Hyacinthe,  while  waiting  for  the  pupils  to  come, 
operated  on  the  quills  like  a  master  in  the  art,  placing 
the  point  on  his  left  thumbnail  so  that  he  might 
bring  down  the  knife  with  the  skill  of  an  adept  and 
make  the  requisite  slit.  But  in  vain  he  sat  and 


190  LITTLE  PIERRE 

trimmed  his  quills,  in  vain  a  notice,  writ  in  round- 
hand  copper  plate,  Gothic  and  sloping,  hung  up  at 
the  front  door  enumerated  the  various  diplomas  of 
the  expert  caligraphist  and  certificated  accountant. 
Not  a  pupil  came.  Then  he  started  as  an  agent  for 
a  life  insurance  company.  His  fine  presence  and 
persuasive  address  would  have  brought  him  many 
clients,  but  wine  and  women  accounted  for  his  initial 
profits  and  prevented  him  from  getting  any  subse- 
quent ones,  and  this,  despite  the  zeal  displayed  by 
Huguet,  who  did  the  touting  on  his  friend's  behalf, 
but  met  with  no  success  because  he  squinted  horribly, 
reeked  of  wine,  and  had  a  stammering  tongue,  and 
because  persuasion  abode  not  within  his  lips.  After 
this  set  back  the  two  cronies  set  up  a  fencing  school  in 
a  plaster-caste  maker's  studio  at  Montrouge.  Hya- 
cinthe  was  the  master,  Huguet  his  assistant.  As  the 
moulder  continued  to  make  use  of  the  studio  in  his 
own  hours,  the  plaster  which  filled  the  chinks  in  the 
floor  rose  up  at  every  assault,  covered  the  feet  of 
the  fencers  and  enveloped  them  in  a  cloud  of  pungent 
dust  which  made  them  weep  and  sneeze  beneath  their 
masks.  It  was  wine  and  women  again  that  put  an 
end  to  this  attempt  to  follow  the  noble  profession 
of  arms.  After  trying  a  few  other  lines  of  business 
of  which  no  record  remains,  Hyacinthe  conceived 
the  brilliant  idea  of  exploiting  "The  Elixir  of  the 
Old  Man  of  the  Mountain,"  prepared  in  accordance 
with  the  formula  of  Dr.  Gibet.  Huguet  distilled 


LITTLE  PIERRE  191 

the  liquor  and  Hyacinthe  "placed"  it  with  the  grocers 
and  chemists.  But  this  partnership  was  brief  and 
looked  as  if  it  was  going  to  have  an  ugly  sequel,  for 
the  police  began  to  suspect  that  "Giber,  Doctor  of 
Medicine,"  was  nothing  but  a  fraud.  It  is  believed 
in  some  quarters  that  Huguet,  the  distiller,  had  a 
month  or  two's  experience  of  prison  life  over  the 
business.  Hyacinthe  then  placed  his  faculties  at  the 
service  of  the  State  and  became  a  market  inspector. 
He  exercised  his  functions  at  night,  but  he  was  more 
often  found  in  the  tavern  than  at  his  post,  and,  al- 
though his  friend  Huguet  did  his  best  to  understudy 
him,  he  was  several  times  reprimanded  and  finally 
dismissed.  This  decision  was  regarded  as  a  political 
measure.  In  the  person  of  Hyacinthe  the  authori- 
ties were  persecuting  one  of  Napoleon's  old  soldiers. 
This  gained  him  the  assistance  of  certain  liberals  who 
procured  him  a  berth  as  a  copyist  and  he  thought  no 
small  beer  of  himself  when  he  had  to  copy  "Les 
Plaideurs  sans  proces,"  a  three-act  comedy  in  verse 
by  M.  fitienne.  "M.  fitienne,"  said  Hyacinthe, 
"deserves  less  kudos  for  having  got  into  the  Insti- 
tute by  merit  than  for  being  turned  out  of  it  again 
by  a  King."  It  is,  of  course,  a  fact  that  in  1816 
fitienne  was  expelled  from  the  Institute  after  its  reor- 
ganization. Meanwhile,  at  Hyacinthe's  instigation, 
Huguet  took  up  the  wine  trade  and  defrauded  the 
Customs,  which  earned  him  some  five  thousand 
francs  profit  and  six  months  in  gaol.  "Not  the  worst 


192  LITTLE  PIERRE 

bit  of  business  I  have  done  by  a  long  chalk,"  said 
Huguet,  on  reflection.  Such  cynicism  was  revolting 
to  the  hero  of  Craonne,  who  had  principles,  pro- 
fessed the  moral  code  of  the  Savoyard  vicar  supple- 
mented by  the  sense  of  military  honour  and  incul- 
cated in  Huguet,  over  their  potations,  what  he  owed 
to  duty  and  the  law.  "Keep  to  the  narrow  path,  or 
get  back  to  it  if  you  have  strayed  from  it.  Innocence 
or  repentance,"  such  was  the  old  soldier's  motto. 
Huguet,  as  he  listened  to  him,  gazed  at  him  in  ad- 
miration and  wept  into  his  glass.  Seeing  him  thus 
rehabilitated  by  repentance,  Hyacinthe  joined  him 
in  the  formation  of  a  company  for  the  distribution 
of  books  and  printed  matter  in  the  city  of  Paris. 
It  did  not  prove  a  success.  It  was,  I  think, 
shortly  after  this  discomfiture  that  Hyacinthe  came 
to  interview  my  mother,  as  I  have  already  related, 
and  became  secretary  to  a  marchand  d'hommes. 

His  enterprises  had  one  thing  in  their  favour: 
they  were  very  short  lived.  He  did  not  remain  long 
buying  men  at  the  sign  of  The  Two  Grenadiers. 
No  one  knows  what  he  did  after  that.  His  final  oc- 
cupation was  the  only  one  known  to  his  family. 
Hyacinthe,  who  by  this  time  was  a  very  old  man, 
opened  an  office  in  the  back  room  of  a  tavern  in  the 
Rue  Rambuteau.  Seated  at  a  table  with  a  bottle  of 
white  wine  and  a  bag  of  roasted  chestnuts  in  front 
of  him,  he  gave  advice  to  the  little  local  tradesfolk 
as  to  how  to  get  out  of  paying  their  debts  and  avoid 


LITTLE  PIERRE  193 

legal  proceedings.  I  don't  know  whether  I  have 
mentioned  it,  but  Uncle  Hyacinthe  was  a  genius  at 
chicanery.  This  trait  gives  the  finishing  touch  to 
his  portrait.  Cunning,  tricky,  familiar  with  all  the 
tortuosities  of  legal  procedure,  he  could  have  given 
points  to  Chicaneau  himself.  The  sight  of  a  writ 
caused  him  to  rub  his  hands  with  glee.  In  his  little 
back  office  he  also  acted  as  secretary  to  the  female 
domestics  round  about.  His  friend  Huguet,  shriv- 
elled up,  lame  but  still  alert,  had  not  forsaken  him. 
They  slept  in  an  outhouse  behind  the  tavern.  Huguet 
taxed  all  his  resources  to  keep  his  friend's  pipe 
charged  with  tobacco.  One  night  he  was  stabbed 
between  the  shoulders  in  an  affray  with  some  roughs. 
He  was  taken  to  the  hospital,  where  Hyacinthe 
went  to  visit  him.  Huguet  smiled  on  him  and 
gave  up  the  ghost.  Hyacinthe  returned  to  his  la- 
bours, drawing  up  leases  and  acting  as  counsel  and 
secretary  to  distressful  shopkeepers  and  lovelorn 
scullery-maids.  But  his  beautiful  handwriting  began 
to  get  shaky,  his  sight  drew  dim  and  his  head  nodded. 
For  hours  at  a  stretch  he  would  sit  dozing  and  va- 
cant. Six  weeks  after  Huguet's  death,  he  fell  down 
in  an  apoplectic  fit.  They  took  him  away  to  the 
house  in  the  Rue  du  Sabot  where  his  poor  wife  was 
living  in  a  single  room.  She  had  not  set  eyes  on  him 
for  forty  years,  but  she  loved  him  just  as  dearly  as 
on  their  wedding  day.  She  nursed  him  with  the  most 
loving  care.  Paralysed  all  down  his  left  side  and 


194  LITTLE  PIERRE 

dragging  one  leg,  he  scarcely  ever  moved  and  hardly 
said  a  word.  Every  morning  she  would  help  him 
from  his  bed  to  the  window  where  he  would  sit  the 
whole  day  looking  towards  the  sun.  She  filled  his 
pipe  for  him  and  her  eyes  never  left  him.  Six  months 
later  he  had  a  second  stroke  and  lived  for  six  days 
unable  to  move.  His  speech  had  quite  gone,  he 
could  only  mutter  unintelligible  sounds;  but  just  as 
he  was  dying  they  thought  they  could  hear  him  call- 
ing out  for  Huguet. 

My  father  never  mentioned  Uncle  Hyacinthe's 
name.  My  mother  avoided  speaking  of  him.  Nev- 
ertheless, she  often  told  the  following  story  which, 
in  her  eyes,  summed  up  the  frivolous  and  deceitful 
character  of  the  man. 

It  was  at  the  time  of  the  Revolution  of  1830. 
Hyacinthe,  though  past  his  fortieth  year,  was  still  a 
man  about  town,  and  home  life  bored  him.  During 
the  Trois  Glorieuses  he  lay  low  hoping  the  people 
would  win  the  day.  On  the  3Oth  July,  after  the  de- 
fection of  the  royal  troops,  when  the  firing  had  quite 
ceased,  and  the  tricolour  was  floating  over  the  Tuil- 
eries,  our  gentleman  ventured  to  show  his  nose  out  of 
doors.  For  reasons  best  known  to  himself,  he  want- 
ed to  get  to  a  place  at  the  corner  of  the  Bastille  and 
the  Faubourg  Saint-Antoine.  He  was  living  at  the 
time  near  the  Barriere  de  1'fitoile,  an  out-of-the-way 
and  lonely  place.  To  achieve  his  object  he  would 
either  have  had  to  foot  it,  beneath  a  scorching  sun. 


LITTLE  PIERRE  195 

along  streets  with  the  pavement  torn  up,  and  get  past 
more  than  thirty  barricades  guarded  by  the  people, 
or  he  would  have  had  to  go  a  long  way  round 
through  some  very  unsafe  quarters  of  the  city.  To 
get  over  the  difficulty  Hyacinthe  bethought  him  of 
an  ingenious  device.  He  betook  himself  to  a  neigh- 
bour of  his  who  kept  a  little  eating  house,  soaked  a 
piece  of  linen  in  some  rabbit's  blood,  tied  it  round 
his  head  and  got  the  landlord  and  a  boy  to  carry  him 
up  to  the  first  barricade,  which  was  hard  by  on  the 
Faubourg  du  Roule.  As  he  had  anticipated,  the  men 
guarding  the  barricade  thought  he  had  been  wound- 
ed. They  took  him  from  his  bearers  and  conveyed 
him  past  the  obstacle  with  every  possible  care.  That 
done,  they  gave  him  a  glass  of  wine  and  picked  out 
two  of  their  number  to  carry  him  along  on  a 
stretcher.  A  procession  formed  and  increased  in 
numbers  as  they  went  along.  A  student  from  the 
ficole  Polytechnique  marched  at  its  head  with  drawn 
sword.  Some  working  men  with  their  shirt  sleeves 
rolled  up  and  sprigs  of  evergreen  thrust  into  their 
rifle  barrels,  marched  on  either  side  of  the  stretcher 
shouting: 

"Honour  the  brave!" 

Some  printers'  apprentices,  recognizable  by  their 
paper  caps,  bakers'  men  clad  all  in  white,  school- 
boys wearing  the  epaulettes  and  leather  trappings  of 
the  Guard,  an  urchin  of  ten  in  a  shako  that  came 


196  LITTLE  PIERRE 

right  down  over  his  ears,  brought  up  the  rear  and 
kept  calling  out: 

"Honour  the  brave  I" 

Women  knelt  down  as  they  passed,  others  tossed 
flowers  to  the  stricken  hero  and  laid  tricolour  rib- 
bons and  laurel  branches  on  the  stretcher.  At  the 
corner  of  the  Rue  Saint-Florentin,  a  grocer  of  liberal 
convictions  delivered  himself  of  an  harangue  and 
presented  him  with  a  medal  stamped  with  a  figure  of 
La  Fayette.  As  the  procession  hove  in  sight,  the 
defenders  of  the  barricades  dragged  paving  stones, 
casks,  carts  and  everything  out  of  the  way  in  order 
to  clear  a  passage  for  the  wounded  man.  All  along 
the  route  the  rebel  sentries  presented  arms,  drums 
beat  a  salute,  bugles  sounded.  Shouts  of  "Hurrah 
for  the  people's  defender.  Hurrah  for  the  supporter 
of  the  Charter  I  Long  live  the  champion  of  Liberty" 
mounted  up  through  a  glare  of  dust  and  sunlight  to 
a  brazen  sky.  At  every  drink-shop  glasses  filled  with 
ruby  liquid  flew  to  the  lips  of  the  unknown  hero 
stretched  on  his  couch  of  glory,  and  whole  bottles 
went  to  slake  the  thirst  of  his  bearers  who  were 
smoking  like  cassolettes. 

And  Uncle  Hyacinthe  was  deposited  with  honour 
in  the  shop  of  Madame  Constance,  laundress,  at 
the  corner  of  the  Place  de  la  Bastille  and  the  Fau- 
bourg Saint-Antoine. 


CHAPTER  XXIII 

BARA 

HAT  I  find  fault  with,"  said  my 
mother,  after  recounting  this 
episode  of  a  disreputable  career  "is 
that  Hyacinthe,  by  this  piece  of 
trickery,  usurped  the  prerogatives 
of  misfortune  and  counterfeited  a 
victim." 

"He  ran  a  big  risk  in  so  doing,"  said  my  god- 
father. "The  popular  enthusiasm  he  had  excited 
would  have  immediately  turned  to  fury  if  he  had 
been  found  out.  He  would  have  been  treated  with 
ignominy  by  those  who  had  honoured  him  as  a  noble 
citizen  and  he  might  have  been  torn  to  pieces  by 
the  furies  who  had  given  him  drink.  An  armed  mob 
is  capable  of  any  outrage.  Nevertheless  it  must  be 
allowed  that  the  Parisian  populace  displayed  much 
restraint  during  the  Trois  Glorieuses  and  in  no  wise 
abused  their  victory.  The  wealthy  middle  classes 
and  the  learned  societies  fought  side  by  side  with 
working  men;  the  students  of  the  ficole  Polytech- 
nique  did  a  great  deal  to  make  success  a  certainty. 
.  And  for  the  most  part  they  distinguished  themselves 
by  acts  of  heroism  and  humanity. 

"One  of  them,  who  made  his  way  into  the  Chateau 
197 


198  LITTLE  PIERRE 

at  the  head  of  a  band  of  popular  troops,  called  on 
the  Royal  Guards  to  surrender.  They  held  the  butt- 
end  of  their  rifles  in  the  air  in  token  of  submission, 
but  the  old  captain  who  commanded  them  rushed 
furiously,  sword  in  hand,  upon  the  Polytechnique 
student.  The  latter,  just  as  the  sword  was  at  his 
breast,  turned  it  aside  and  managed  to  wrest  it 
away.  He  then  returned  it  to  the  officer  saying, 
'Monsieur,  take  back  this  sword  which  you  have 
wielded  with  honour  on  so  many  fields  of  battle  but 
which  you  will  never  more  employ  against  the  peo- 
ple.' The  Captain,  overcome  with  admiration  and 
gratitude,  removed  the  Cross  of  the  Legion  of 
Honour  from  his  tunic  and  presented  it  to  his  young 
adversary  saying,  'Doubtless  the  country  will  one 
day  confer  this  decoration  upon  you.  Permit  me 
now  to  offer  you  the  insignia.'  In  this  civil  struggle, 
it  was  the  sentiment  of  honour  and  patriotism  that 
diminished  the  bitterness  between  the  combatants." 

My  godfather  had  scarcely  finished  his  story  when 
M.  Marc  Ribert  began  on  another: 

"On  the  28th  July,"  he  said,  "when  the  Parisian 
troops  on  the  Place  de  l'H6tel-de-Ville  were  be- 
coming demoralized  under  a  heavy  fire,  a  young  man, 
bearing  a  tricolour  flag  fixed  to  the  point  of  a  lance, 
rushed  forward  to  within  ten  paces  of  the  Garde 
Royale  crying,  'Citizens,  see  how  sweet  it  is  to  die 
for  freedom !'  And  he  fell,  riddled  with  bullets." 

My  mother,  touched  at  the  recital  of  these  heroic 


LITTLE  PIERRE  199 

deeds,  asked  how  it  was  that  such  noble  acts  were 
not  more  generally  known  and  more  widely  cele- 
brated. 

My  godfather  gave  many  reasons : 

"The  wars  of  the  Monarchy,  of  the  Revolution 
and  of  the  Empire  have  saturated  the  history  of 
France  with  acts  of  heroism,  so  that  there  is  no 
room  for  any  more.  Besides,  the  glory  attaching  to 
the  conquerors  of  July  is  obliterated  by  the  insignifi- 
cance of  their  success.  They  did  but  bring  about  the 
triumph  of  mediocrity,  and  the  dynasty  that  came 
into  being  as  a  result  of  their  devotion  never  cared 
to  recall  its  origins,  so,  you  see,  even  heroes  are  not 
immune  from  the  caprices  of  destiny." 

"Possibly,"  said  my  mother,  "yet  it  is  a  great  pity 
that  a  noble  deed  should  sink  into  oblivion." 

On  hearing  this,  old  M.  Dubois,  who  had  been 
toying  with  his  snuff-box  during  the  whole  conversa- 
tion, turned  his  great  calm  countenance  upon  my 
mother. 

"Do  not  be  too  eager  to  tax  Fate  with  injustice, 
Madame  Noziere.  All  these  brave  deeds,  all  these 
fine  speeches,  are  but  fables  and  empty  hearsay.  If 
it  is  impossible  to  give  an  accurate  account  of  things 
said  and  done  in  an  attentive  and  orderly  assembly, 
is  one  likely,  my  dear  madame,  to  be  able  to  take 
stock  of  a  gesture  or  a  speech  amid  the  tumult  of  a 
combat.  It  matters  little  to  me,  gentlemen,  that 
your  stories  are  imaginary  and  without  any  founda- 


200  LITTLE  PIERRE 

tion  in  fact;  what  is  of  prime  importance  is  that 
their  whole  conception  is  alien  alike  to  Nature  and 
to  Art,  they  lack  the  beautiful  simplicity  that  is 
the  sole  preservative  against  the  corrosion  of  time. 
That  is  why  we  should  let  them  moulder  undisturbed 
in  those  back  Christmas  numbers  in  which  they  lie 
embalmed.  Historic  truth  is  not  concerned  with 
those  magnificent  examples  of  heroism  that  are  ban- 
died about  from  mouth  to  mouth,  from  one  genera- 
tion to  another;  they  have  no  existence  outside  the 
realms  of  Art  and  Poetry.  I  know  not  whether 
Bara,  the  youth  whose  life  the  Chouans  promised  to 
spare  on  condition  that  he  shouted,  'Long  live  the 
King,'  actually  shouted  'Long  live  the  Republic,'  and 
so  fell  pierced  by  a  score  of  bayonets  as  a  reward — 
I  know  not,  nor  ever  shall  know.  But  I  do  know 
that  the  picture  of  the  child,  laying  down  his  life, 
still  in  its  very  flower,  for  Freedom's  sake,  brings 
tears  into  our  eyes  and  fire  into  our  hearts,  and  that 
no  more  perfect  symbol  of  sacrifice  could  possibly  be 
imagined.  I  know,  too,  I  know  above  all,  that  when 
David,  the  sculptor,  brings  this  child  before  me  in  all 
his  pure  and  charming  artlessness,  giving  himself  up 
to  death  with  the  serenity  of  the  stricken  amazon 
in  the  Vatican,  his  cockade  clasped  to  his  bosom,  and 
in  his  death-cold  hand  one  of  the  drumsticks  with 
which  he  had  been  sounding  the  charge,  the  miracle 
is  wrought,  the  boy-hero  is  created,  Bara  lives,  Bara 
is  immortal  I" 


CHAPTER  XXIV 

MELANIE 

BOUT  this  time  a  cruel  blow  fell  upon 
me.  Melanie  began  to  fail.  Up  to 
then,  the  different  ages  of  man  had 
only  affected  me  by  their  amusing 
diversity.  Old  age  I  liked  because 
it  was  picturesque,  sometimes  comic 
and  easy  to  make  fun  of;  I  had  yet  to  learn  that  it 
was  burdensome  and  sad.  Yes,  Melanie  was  grow- 
ing old!  Her  basket  began  to  weigh  over-heavily 
on  her  arm,  and  when  she  came  in  from  her  shop- 
ping, you  could  hear  her  troubled  breathing  from 
the  foot  of  the  stairs  through  all  the  rooms.  Her 
eyes  were  dim,  dimmer  than  the  ever-clouded  glasses 
of  her  spectacles,  and  they  were  growing  weaker 
day  by  day.  Her  failing  sight  caused  her  to  make 
mistakes  which  at  first  made  me  laugh,  but  which 
soon  began  to  distress  me,  so  frequent  and  so  woe- 
ful they  became.  She  would  take  the  lump  of  bees- 
wax she  kept  to  polish  the  floor  for  a  crust  of  bread, 
and  a  soiled  duster  for  the  chicken  she  had  just 
plucked.  One  day,  thinking  to  sit  down  on  her 
stool,  she  sat  down  instead  on  a  toy  theatre  my 
godfather  had  given  me.  She  was  so  mortally  terri- 
fied at  the  crash  that  she  forgot  all  about  saying 


201 


202  LITTLE  PIERRE 

she  was  sorry.  Her  memory  was  going;  she  mixed 
up  the  different  periods  of  her  life.  She  would  talk 
about  the  open-air  ball  that  took  place  at  the  Em- 
peror's Coronation  when  she  danced  with  the  Mayor 
of  the  village,  and  tell  how,  at  the  time  of  the  in- 
vasion, she  had  refused,  at  some  peril  to  herself,  to 
kiss  a  Cossack  who  was  billeted  at  the  farm,  re- 
ferring to  these  events  as  if  they  had  just  recently 
happened.  She  repeated  the  same  stories  over  and 
over  again,  and  was  everlastingly  telling  us  how  bit- 
terly cold  the  weather  was  on  the  i5th  December, 
1840,  when  the  Emperor  was  brought  back  to  Paris 
from  St.  Helena.  His  petit  chapeau  and  his  sword 
had  been  placed  on  his  coffin.  She  had  seen  them, 
but  nevertheless,  she  did  not  believe  that  he  was 
dead.  She  began  to  worry  herself  and  get  muddled. 
She  could  not  quit  the  kitchen  for  a  minute  without 
being  afraid  she  had  left  the  water  running,  and 
her  fear  lest  the  place  should  be  flooded  spoiled  all 
those  walks  of  ours  that  had  once  been  so  happy 
and  free  from  care. 

I  thought  it  odd  that  my  old  nurse  should  be  like 
this,  but  it  did  not  disturb  me,  for  I  did  not  realize 
that  she  would  grow  worse ;  but  one  evening  I  heard 
my  father  and  mother  talking  together  in  an  under- 
tone: 

"Melanie  is  failing  every  day,  my  dear.  You  can 
see  it." 

"She  is  like  a  lamp  going  out  for  want  of  oil." 


LITTLE  PIERRE  203 

"Do  you  think  it's  safe  for  Pierrot  to  go  about 
with  her  out  of  doors?" 

"Ah,  my  dear  Antoinette,  she  loves  the  child  too 
well  not  to  have  enough  strength  and  intelligence 
left  in  her  old  heart  still  to  take  good  care  of  him." 

These  words  came  as  a  revelation  to  me.  I  un- 
derstood— and  I  wept.  The  idea  that  life  is  fleet- 
ing, that  it  flows  by  like  a  stream,  then  dawned  on  me 
for  the  first  time,  and  from  that  day  forth  I  clung 
with  wistful  eagerness  to  my  old  nurse's  bony  arms 
and  toil-worn  hands.  I  flung  my  arms  about  her, 
but  even  then  she  had  eluded  me. 

During  that  summer,  which  was  a  very  fine  one, 
her  strength  improved  and  her  memory  came  back. 
She  bloomed  anew,  bustling  about  round  her  oven 
and  her  saucepans,  and  I  began  to  tease  her  again. 
She  went  and  did  her  daily  shopping,  and  came  back 
not  too  much  out  of  breath,  and  did  not  find  her 
basket  over-heavy.  It  was  like  old  times  again.  But 
when  the  wet  days  returned,  she  complained  of  feel- 
ing giddy.  "I'm  like  a  tipsy  woman,"  she  used  to 
declare.  One  day  she  went  out  as  usual.  A  little 
while  later  there  was  a  ring  at  the  door.  It  was 
M.  Menage,  who  had  discovered  Melanie  in  a  faint- 
ing fit  at  the  foot  of  the  staircase.  She  soon  came 
round  again  and  my  father  said  she  would  get  over 
it  that  time.  I  looked  at  M.  Menage  with  eager 
curiosity  and  studied  him  with  an  attentiveness  be- 
yond my  years,  for  I  had  made  greater  progress  in 


204  LITTLE  PIERRE 

observation  than  in  manners.  It  was  true  that  M. 
Menage  had  a  red,  forked  beard,  that  he  wore  a 
Rubens  hat  and  breeches  a  la  hussarde.  But  he  did 
not  look  at  all  the  sort  of  man  to  drink  blazing 
punch  from  a  dead  man's  skull.  Laying  Melanie  on 
the  sofa,  he  raised  her  head  and  performed  the  of- 
fice of  the  Good  Samaritan  quite  unaffectedly.  He 
seemed  gentle  and  intelligent.  With  his  fine  eyes, 
sad,  tender  eyes  with  a  hint  of  weariness  in  them,  he 
gazed  about  him  in  a  friendly  way,  and  I  thought  I 
saw  them  light  up  with  a  smile  as  they  lingered  oil 
my  mother's  beautiful  hair.  He  looked  at  me  with 
as  much  benevolence  as  a  plain  child  was  calculated 
to  inspire,  and  advised  my  parents  to  let  Nature, 
that  source  of  all  energy,  have  her  way  with  me. 

M.  Menage  was  warmly  complimented  and 
thanked.  My  mother  was  visibly  touched  by  his 
thoughtfulness  in  bringing  back  the  basket.  Me- 
lanie alone  showed  no  gratitude  to  the  painter  for 
coming  to  her  rescue.  He  had  once  gravely  of- 
fended her  by  drawing  a  suppliant  Cupid  on  her 
bedroom  door,  and  she  had  never  forgiven  him  for 
taking  such  a  liberty,  so  potent  is  the  sense  of  honour 
in  the  bosom  of  a  virtuous  woman. 

As  the  doctor  had  prognosticated,  our  old  servant 
recovered  sufficiently  to  get  about  again,  but  it  was 
clearly  time  for  her  to  give  up  work. 

There  was  a  deal  of  whispering  behind  the  scenes, 
a  lot  of  sighing,  wiping  away  of  tears,  and  tying  up 


LITTLE  PIERRE  205 

of  parcels.  Covert  references  were  made  to  one  of 
Melanie's  nieces  who  had  married  a  farmer  named 
Denisot,  and  worked  a  farm  with  her  husband  at 
Jouy-en-Josas. 

One  morning  this  niece  appeared,  humble  and 
grim,  a  tall,  gaunt,  swarthy  woman.  Her  teeth  were 
very  big,  but  few  in  number.  She  had  come  to  fetch 
her  Aunt  Melanie  and  to  take  her  away  to  her  home 
at  Jouy.  I  felt  that  it  was  useless  to  resist,  and  I 
burst  into  tears.  We  kissed  good-bye.  To  comfort 
me,  my  mother  promised  to  take  me  to  Jouy  one 
day  soon.  Poor  old  Melanie  was  more  dead  than 
alive,  but  I  was  struck  by  one  profound  and  subtle 
thing  about  her.  I  saw  that  when  she  took  off  her 
apron  she  had  severed  the  ties  that  had  bound  her 
to  bourgeois  life,  and  that  she  was  now  a  person 
between  myself  and  whom  there  was  no  longer  any 
bond  of  union;  she  was  now,  in  short,  a  peasant,  and 
I  knew  that  my  beloved  Melanie  was  lost  to  me  be- 
yond recall. 

We  went  out  to  see  her  into  the  trap  in  which  she 
was  to  take  her  seat  beside  her  niece.  A  flick  of 
the  whip  at  the  mare's  ears  and  off  they  went.  The 
little  white  circular  crown  of  her  rustic  cap  looked 
like  a  cheese,  and  I  watched  it  disappear  into  the 
distance.  That  was  my  first  sorrow,  and  I  feel  it 
still. 

By  losing  Melanie  I  was  losing  more  than  I  knew. 
I  was  bidding  good-bye  to  the  sweetness  and  joy 


206  LITTLE  PIERRE 

of  my  earliest  childhood.  My  mother,  who  knew 
Melanie's  worth,  was  generous  enough  to  feel  no 
jealousy  at  the  love  I  bore  my  old  nurse,  and,  if  that 
love  was  not  so  great  or  so  august  as  that  which  I 
kept  for  my  mother,  it  was,  perhaps,  more  tender 
and  assuredly  more  "intimate." 

Melanie's  heart  was  as  simple  as  my  own.  It 
was  because  there  were  no  sophisticated  ideas  be- 
tween us  that  we  were  so  near  to  each  other.  Me- 
lanie  was  already  old  when  I  was  born,  and  she  was 
not  given  to  mirth.  That  indeed  she  could  not  be, 
for  her  life  had  been  a  hard  one,  but  her  shining 
innocence  was  to  her  instead  of  youth,  instead  of 
mirthfulness. 

No  less,  nay  more,  than  my  mother  herself,  Me- 
lanie  formed  my  mode  of  speech.  That,  I  have  no 
cause  to  regret.  Unlettered  as  she  was,  she  spoke 
well. 

She  spoke  well  because  the  words  she  used  were 
the  words  that  persuade,  the  words  that  console. 
When  I  tumbled  down  on  the  gravel  and  grazed  my 
knees  or  the  tip  of  my  nose,  she  spoke  healing  and 
comfortable  words.  If  I  told  her  a  lie,  if  I  showed 
selfishness,  if  I  flew  into  a  passion,  she  would  utter 
the  words  which  bring  back  to  the  heart  confidence 
and  strength  and  peace.  To  her  I  owe  the  basis  of 
my  moral  code,  and  the  additions  I  have  since  made 
thereto  are  not  so  firm  as  that  old  foundation. 

From  the  lips  of  my  old  nurse,  I  learnt  sound 


LITTLE  PIERRE  207 

honest  French.  Melanie's  speech  was  the  speech  of 
the  peasantry,  it  smacked  of  the  countryside.  She 
used  to  say  castrole,  ormoirc  and  colidor  (instead 
of  casserole,  armoire,  and  corridor.)*  With  that  ex- 
ception she  could  have  instructed  more  than  one  pro- 
fessor, more  than  one  academician,  in  the  art  of 
speaking.  From  her  lips  there  flowed  the  light, 
limpid  diction  of  our  forefathers.  Not  knowing 
how  to  read,  she  pronounced  her  words  as  she  had 
heard  them  as  a  child,  and  they  from  whom  she  had 
learned  them  were  untutored  folk  who  spoke  as 
with  the  voice  of  Nature  herself.  And  thus  it  was 
that  MelamVs  way  of  talking  was  both  natural  and 
seemly.  Words  as  rich  in  colour  and  as  full  of 

*  When  educated  people  like  ourselves  say  If  lierre  for  I'ierre 
and  It  lendemain  for  I' en  demain,  we  ought  not  to  turn  up  our  noses 
when  we  hear  common  folk  talk.  Melanie  used  to  say  une  legume 
and  canefon  for  calefon;  but  just  a  moment!  You  find  une  legume 
in  La  Bruyere  and  canefon  is  in  the  Etat  de  la  France  pour  1692. 
This  reminds  me  of  a  story  which  Melanie  once  told  me,  and  which 
I  cannot  refrain  from  setting  down  here.  One  day  during  that 
lovely  summer  which  was  destined  to  be  the  last  we  were  to  spend 
together,  as  she  was  sitting  on  a  seat  in  the  Luxembourg,  I  fell  to 
devouring  her  wrinkled  cheeks  with  kisses.  Whereat  the  dear  old 
thing,  pretending  to  be  alarmed,  cried:  "Why,  are  you  going  to  eat 
me  all  up,  mon  petit  monsieur!  Have  you  turned  into  a  were- 
wolf?" 

I  asked  her  what  a  were-wolf  was.  She  didn't  answer  my 
question,  but  this  is  the  story  she  told  me: 

"In  my  young  days  there  was  a  certain  boy  concerning  whom 
the  report  got  about  at  the  village  inn  that  he  was  a  wolf  and 
was  destined  to  eat  his  mother.  The  boy,  who  was  simple-minded, 
took  it  seriously.  When  he  returned  home  that  night  he  went  up  to 
his  mother,  who  had  gone  to  bed,  and  said  to  her: 

"  'Mother,  my  poor  mother,  I  have  got  to  eat  you.  Give  me  your 
blessing.  I  am  going  to  devour  you  .  .  .'  " 

At  this  point  Melanie  stopped  short.  In  vain  I  urged  her  to 
continue.  She  would  tell  me  no  more.  There  was  this  excellent 
characteristic  about  Melanie's  stories — they  never  ended. 


208  LITTLE  PIERRE 

savour  as  the  fruits  of  our  orchards  came  to  her  with- 
out effort.  Her  discourse  abounded  in  humorous 
saws,  wise  proverbs,  and  illustrations  drawn  from 
the  life  of  Held  and  farmstead. 


CHAPTER  XXV 

RADEGONDE 

T'S  a  little  servant,  dear,"  said  my 
mother  to   Dr.   Noziere,    "a   little 
maid  from  Tours  recommended  by 
Madame  Caumont.    I  should  rather 
like  you  to  see  her.     She  has  only 
been  in  one  place  before,  and  that 
was  at  an  old  maiden  lady's  somewhere  near  Tours. 
They  say  she  is  thoroughly  trustworthy." 

And  indeed  it  was  high  time,  for  the  peace  and 
order  of  our  establishment,  that  we  should  get  an 
honest  servant  from  somewhere.  During  the  period 
— it  was  rather  more  than  a  year — that  had  elapsed 
since  Melanie  left,  we  had  had  a  dozen  or  so  of 
servants,  of  whom  the  better  ones  departed  as  soon 
as  they  found  that  money  was  none  too  plentiful. 
We  had  had  Sycorax  who  cultivated  a  beard  on  her 
chin  and  provided  us  with  nutriment  from  her 
witch's  cauldron.  Then  we  had  a  girl  of  eighteen 
with  a  very  pretty  face.  She  knew  nothing  of  house- 
work, but  my  mother  thought  she  would  be  able  to 
train  her.  She  went  off  after  three  days,  with  half  a 
dozen  silver  spoons  and  forks.  Next  we  had  some 

one  who  had  escaped  from  the  Salpetriere;  she  said 

209 


210  LITTLE  PIERRE 

she  was  a  daughter  of  Louis  Philippe  and  wore  a 
string  of  corks  round  her  neck.  And  my  father — a 
member  of  the  faculty — had  been  the  last,  dear, 
good,  simple  man,  to  perceive  that  she  was  off  her 
head.  Then  there  was  La  Chouette  who  slept  all 
day  when  she  ought  to  have  been  working,  and  at 
night,  when  we  imagined  she  was  in  her  attic,  ran  a 
little  tavern  down  at  the  far  end  of  a  court,  in  the 
Rue  Mouffetard,  where  she  dispensed  the  wine  she 
had  stolen  from  our  cellar  to  a  gang  of  thieves  and 
vagabonds.  For  the  rest,  she  was  a  first-rate  cook,  a 
thorough  expert  in  the  art,  said  my  godfather,  and 
he  knew  what  he  was  talking  about.  Hortense  Per- 
cepied,  the  last,  was,  like  Penelope,  awaiting  the 
return  of  her  spouse  who  had  gone  off  to  Icaria  with 
Cabot;  she  also  resembled  Penelope  in  that  she 
attracted  a  number  of  suitors  who  used  to  come  and 
take  their  meals  in  the  kitchen. 

There  was  the  same  complaint  among  the  middle 
classes  in  those  days  as  there  is  now.  "You  can't 
get  servants  anywhere.  Things  are  not  what  they 
used  to  be  when  you  could  pick  up  a  good,  faithful, 
steady-going  maid  without  any  trouble.  Now  things 
are  quite  different."  Some  people  blamed  the  Revo- 
lution, which,  they  said,  had  put  all  sorts  of  high- 
falutin  notions  into  the  heads  of  the  working-classes 
and  made  them  dissatisfied.  But  when  were  people 
not  dissatisfied?  The  truth  of  the  matter  is  that 
good  masters  and  good  servants  are  rare  and  always 


LITTLE  PIERRE  211 

have  been.  You  don't  often  come  across  an  Epic- 
tetus  or  a  Marcus  Aurelius  in  your  journeys  up  and 
down  the  world. 

My  dear  mamma  awaited  the  arrival  of  the  new 
maid  not  indeed  with  a  blind  confidence,  for  that  was 
not  her  way,  but  certainly  not  without  a  favourable 
presentiment  which  she  was  at  no  pains  to  conceal. 
Whence  did  this  arise?  It  was  because  she  was  told 
that  she  was  a  respectable  girl,  the  daughter  of 
honest  countryfolk,  and  that  she  had  been  trained 
in  housework  by  an  old  maiden  lady  who  belonged 
to  a  family  of  soldiers  and  magistrates  in  the  prov- 
inces; moreover,  my  mother  had  it  from  the  Abbe 
Moinier,  her  confessor,  that  it  is  a  great  sin  to  give 
way  to  despair. 

"What  is  she  called?"  asked  my  father. 

"She  can  be  called  what  you  like,  dear.  She  was 
christened  Radegonde." 

"I  don't  care  much  about  the  present-day  fashion 
of  tampering  with  servant's  names;  it  seems  to  me 
that  if  you  take  away  the  names  of  members  of  the 
human  society,  you  rob  them  of  a  part  of  their  per- 
sonality. Still,  I  confess  Radegonde  is  rather  a 
mouthful." 

When  the  young  girl  was  announced,  my  mother 
did  not  send  me  out  of  the  room ;  this  may  have  been 
because  she  forgot  to  do  so  (for  it  was  a  charming 
characteristic  of  hers  that  she  mingled  a  certain 
thoughtlessness  with  the  most  watchful  prudence) 


212  LITTLE  PIERRE 

or  because  she  thought  there  was  no  objection  to  my 
taking  part  in  an  innocent  domestic  interview.  Rade- 
gonde  stumped  in  with  big,  loud  strides.  She  planted 
herself  in  the  middle  of  the  drawing-room  and  stood 
bolt  upright,  motionless  and  mute,  her  hands  folded 
over  her  apron,  half  scared,  half  defiant.  She  was 
very  young,  little  more  than  a  child.  She  had  a 
florid  complexion,  and  she  was  neither  fair  nor  dark, 
neither  plain  nor  good-looking.  There  was  a  simple, 
yet  wide-awake  look  about  her  which  afforded  an 
amusing  contrast.  She  was  dressed  like  the  humblest 
little  country  girl  of  her  district,  but  yet  not  without 
a  certain  splendour;  her  hair  was  gathered  up  be- 
neath a  lace  cap  with  a  great  flat  top  to  it,  her 
shoulders  were  covered  with  a  flower-patterned  scar- 
let shawl.  She  was  very  serious  and  very  comic.  She 
took  my  fancy  right  away,  and  I  noticed  that  my 
parents  were  not  displeased  with  her.  My  mother 
asked  her  if  she  could  sew.  She  replied ,  "Yes, 
madam."  "Cook?"  "Yes,  madam."  "Iron?" 
"Yes,  madam."  "Turn  out  a  room?"  "Yes, 
madam."  "Do  mending?"  "Yes,  madam." 

If  my  mother  had  asked  her  whether  she  could 
forge  cannon,  build  cathedrals,  compose  poems,  rule 
nations,  she  would  still  have  replied,  "Yes,  madam," 
because  obviously  she  said  "Yes,"  without  any  re- 
gard to  the  meaning  of  the  questions  asked  her,  out 
of  pure  politeness,  because  she  thought  it  was  the 
proper  thing,  and  because  her  parents  had  taught 


LITTLE  PIERRE  213 

her  that  it  was  not  good  manners  to  say  no  to 
your  superiors: 

"Or  d'aller  lui  dire  non,» 
Sans  quelque  valable  excuse, 
Ce  n'est  pas  comme  on  en  use 
Avec  des  divinites." 

Thus  says  La  Fontaine  who  would  never  have  been 
able  to  say  no  to  Mademoiselle  de  Sillery. 

But  my  mother  made  no  further  inquiries  regard- 
ing the  qualifications  of  the  little  village  maiden.  She 
told  her  gently  but  firmly  that  she  required  her  to  be 
neat  in  appearance  and  always  to  be  well  conducted, 
promised  to  write  to  her  as  soon  as  she  had  come 
to  a  decision,  and  dismissed  her  with  the  faintest 
suspicion  of  a  smile.  As  she  withdrew,  little  Rade- 
gonde  somehow  or  other  caught  the  pocket  of  her 
apron  on  the  door  handle.  This  incident  was  ob- 
served by  me  alone.  I  noted  every  circumstance,  and 
I  was  struck  with  the  look  of  surprise  and  reproach 
which  Radegonde  gave  the  offending  door  knob  as 
though  it  had  been  an  evil  spirit  trying  to  hold  her 
captive,  as  we  read  in  fairy  tales. 

"What  do  you  think  of  her,  Francois?"  said  my 
mother. 

"She  is  very  young,"  replied  the  doctor,  "and 
then  .  .  ." 

Peradventure  he  may  at  that  moment  have  caught 
a  vague  and  fleeting  notion  of  the  genius  of  Rade- 

•Now  to  go  and  say  no  without  a  valid  excuse — that's  not  the 
way  to  behave  with  gods  and  goddesses. 


214  LITTLE  PIERRE 

gonde,  but  it  vanished  ere  he  gave  it  utterance. 
He  did  not  finish  what  he  was  saying.  For  me, 
little  as  I  was,  and  on  a  level  with  little  things,  I  had 
already  seen  enough  to  know  that  this  little  peasant 
girl  would  change  our  peaceful  abode  into  a  haunted 
house. 

"She  looks  a  nice  little  thing  enough,"  said  my 
mother.  "Perhaps  I  shall  be  able  to  train  her.  If 
you  like,  dear,  we  will  call  her  Justine." 


CHAPTER  XXVI 

CAIRE 

E  were  Born  on  the  very  same  day 
and  at  the  very  same  hour  and  we 
had  grown  up  together.  At  first 
he  had  answered  to  the  name  of 
Puck,  which  my  father  had  given 
him.  He  was  afterwards  called 
Caire,  and  the  change  was  not  to  his  honour,  if 
honour,  that  is  to  say,  has  anything  to  do  with 
honesty.  Seeing  how  clever  he  was  at  deceit,  how 
cunning  a  thief,  and  how  rich  in  rascality,  and 
obliged,  withal,  to  admire  the  wit  and  address  with 
which  he  perpetrated  his  trickeries,  we  called  him 
Robert  Macaire,  after  that  delightful  highwayman 
in  Frederick  Lemaitre's  play,  written  fifteen  years 
before — Robert  Macaire  whom  the  deft  crayon  of 
Honore  Daumier  had  represented,  in  the  comic 
papers,  successively  as  a  financier,  a  deputy,  a 
peer  of  France,  and  a  Minister  of  State.  The  name 
Robert  Macaire  having  been  found  too  long,  we  had 
cut  it  down  to  Caire.  He  was  a  little  brown  dog 
of  no  particular  breed  but  with  plenty  of  brain.  That 
was  no  wonder;  Finette,  his  mother,  used  to  do  her 
marketing  herself,  paid  the  dog's  meat  man  his 

215 


216  LITTLE  PIERRE 

money,   and  brought  back  her  meat  to  Madame 
Mathias  to  be  cooked. 

Caire's  understanding  had  developed  much  sooner 
than  mine,  and  he  had  long  been  practising  the  art  of 
gaining  his  livelihood  when  I  was  still  in  complete 
ignorance  concerning  both  the  world  and  myself. 
As  long  as  I  was  an  infant  in  arms,  he  was  jealous 
of  me;  he  never  tried  to  bite  me,  either  because 
he  thought  it  was  too  risky  or  because  he  looked 
on  me  with  contempt  rather  than  dislike,  but  he 
glowered  at  my  mother  and  my  old  nurse  with 
that  gloomy  and  miserable  air  which  betokens 
envy.  A  shred  of  wisdom  which  this  unhappy 
passion  left  him  prompted  him  to  avoid  them,  as 
far  as  one  can  avoid  people  with  whom  one  has  to 
live.  He  used  to  run  off  to  my  father  and  spend  his 
days  under  the  doctor's  table  curled  up  on  a  hideous 
sheepskin  mat.  As  soon  as  I  was  able  to  walk  a  little, 
his  feelings  towards  me  underwent  a  change.  He 
became  sympathetic  and  took  pleasure  in  playing  with 
the  weakly,  tottering  little  creature.  When  I  was 
old  enough  to  understand  things  I  admired  him.  I 
recognized  him  as  my  superior  in  his  profound 
knowledge  of  Nature,  but  in  many  points  I  had 
caught  him  up. 

If  Descartes  maintained,  in  complete  defiance  of 
probability,  that  animals  are  machines,  we  must 
excuse  him,  for  he  was  compelled  to  do  so  by  his 
philosophy,  and  a  philosopher  always  thinks  more 


LITTLE  PIERRE  217 

of  his  theories,  which  are  part  of  himself,  than  he 
does  of  Nature,  which  is  external  to  him.  There 
are  no  Cartesians  nowadays,  but  there  may  still  be 
people  who  will  tell  you  that  animals  possess  in- 
stinct and  men  understanding.  When  I  was  a  child 
that  was  the  generally  professed  belief.  It  was  an 
absurdity.  Animals  have  understanding  just  as  we 
have.  It  only  differs  from  ours  because  their  organs 
are  different,  and,  like  ours,  it  contains  the  world. 
Like  animals  we  possess  that  secret  genius,  that  un- 
conscious wisdom  called  instinct,  which  is  far  more 
precious  than  the  understanding.  Without  it  neither 
flesh,  worm,  nor  Man  could  survive  an  instant. 

I  hold  with  La  Fontaine,  who  was  a  better  philos- 
opher than  Descartes,  that  animals,  particularly  in 
their  wild  state,  are  full  of  art  and  ingenuity.  By 
taming  them  we  diminish  their  spirit  and  cramp  their 
intelligence.  What  capacity  for  thought  would  be 
left  to  men  supposing  them  reduced  to  the  condition 
to  which  we  reduce  dogs  and  horses,  not  to  mention 
the  denizens  of  the  poultry  yard?  When  Zeus  suf- 
fers a  man  to  fall  into  bondage,  he  deprives  him  of 
half  his  worth.  In  fine,  whether  domesticated  or 
wild,  the  creatures  of  air,  earth,  and  water  are  one 
with  us,  in  that,  far  down  in  the  depths  of  their  being, 
they  unite  to  instinct,  which  is  unerring,  reason, 
which  is  fallible.  Like  men,  they  are  liable  to  go 
astray.  Caire  made  mistakes  sometimes. 

He  had  a  tender  affection  for  Zerbin.     Zerbin 


2i8  LITTLE  PIERRE 

was  a  spaniel  belonging  to  M.  Caumont,  the  book- 
seller. A  well-brought-up  dog.  He  came  of  good, 
respectable  parents,  and  he  loved  Caire  with  a  still 
greater  affection.  They  were  all  in  all  to  each  other. 
Caire's  unfortunate  reputation  had  extended  to  Zer- 
bin,  who  was  now  called  Zerbin  no  longer,  but  Bert- 
rand  after  Robert  Macaire's  companion  in  misdeeds. 
Caire  led  Zerbin  astray,  and  soon  made  a  rogue  of 
him.  Whenever  they  could  slip  away  unobserved, 
they  trotted  off  together,  whither  heaven  only  knows, 
and  came  back  coated  with  mud,  and  limping — ears 
torn,  eyes  bloodshot,  but  tails  up,  and  happy. 

M.  Caumont  would  not  let  his  spaniel  have  any- 
thing to  do  with  our  dog.  Melanie,  in  order  to 
avoid  humiliation  and  reproaches,  made  up  her  mind 
that  Caire  should  not  cultivate  a  neighbour  of  supe- 
rior lineage  and  appearance  to  himself,  but  friend- 
ship is  resourceful  and  laughs  at  obstacles.  In  spite 
of  the  watch  that  was  set  on  them,  in  spite  of  bolts 
and  bars,  they  discovered  countless  means  of  getting 
together.  Perching  himself  up  on  the  ledge  inside 
the  dining-room  window,  which  looked  on  to  the 
court,  Caire  sat  and  waited  till  his  friend  should 
issue  from  the  bookshop.  Bertrand  would  put  him- 
self on  view  in  the  court  and  gaze  up  with  gentle, 
pleading  eyes  at  the  window  whence  Caire  sat  look- 
ihg  affectionately  down  at  him.  In  spite  of  every 
precaution,  they  were  together  in  five  minutes  and 
off  on  all  kinds  of  jaunts  and  mysterious  expedi- 


LITTLE  PIERRE  219 

tions.  But  one  day  Bertrand,  at  his  customary  hour, 
appeared  in  the  courtyard  got  up  like  a  sort  of  minia- 
ture lion  and  looking  highly  ridiculous.  He  had 
been  trimmed  and  clipped  by  one  of  those  men  who  in 
summer-time  come  and  ply  their  calling  at  the  water's 
edge  down  by  the  Pont  Neuf.  His  coat  was  ruffled 
up  about  his  shoulders  so  as  to  look  like  a  mane.  His 
hind  quarters  and  his  belly  had  been  clipped  close. 
They  had  a  naked,  starveling  appearance  and 
showed,  through  his  poor  shaven  skin,  a  dirty  pink 
colour  with  dark  blue  patches  here  and  there.  There 
were  little  fuzzy  tufts  round  his  legs  just  above  the 
paw,  like  cuffs,  and  a  tuft,  pathetically  droll,  adorned 
the  tip  of  his  tail.  Caire  examined  him  attentively 
for  some  time,  and  then  turned  away  his  head;  he 
did  not  recognize  him.  Bertrand  whined  and  begged 
and  pleaded;  he  gazed  at  him  with  his  lovely,  wistful 
eyes,  but  all  in  vain.  Caire  looked  at  him  no  more 
and  sat  there  waiting. 

People  say  that  a  dog  never  laughs.  I  have  seen 
our  Caire  laugh,  and  it  was  not  a  pleasant  laugh.  He 
laughed  a  silent  laugh,  but  the  tension  of  his  lips  and 
a  certain  wrinkle  in  the  cheek  betokened  mockery 
and  sarcasm.  One  morning  I  was  out  shopping  with 
my  old  nurse.  Mouton,  the  dog  belonging  to  M. 
Courcelles,  the  grocer,  Mouton,  a  Newfoundland 
that  could  have  swallowed  Caire  at  a  mouthful,  the 
magnificent  Mouton,  who  was  lying  stretched  out  be- 
fore his  master's  door,  was  nonchalantly  holding  a 


220  LITTLE  PIERRE 

leg  of  mutton  bone  betwixt  his  forepaws.  Caire  in- 
spected him  for  a  long  time  without  accosting  him 
in  any  way,  an  omission  which,  in  the  dog  world, 
betrays  a  lack  of  good  breeding.  But  Caire  didn't 
trouble  himself  much  about  manners.  Mouton,  ob- 
serving the  approach  of  a  horse  of  his  acquaintance 
that  was,  as  usual,  drawing  a  cartload  of  Dutch 
cheeses,  let  go  his  bone  and  got  up  to  pass  the  time 
of  day  with  his  friend.  Seizing  his  opportunity, 
Caire  slyly  picked  up  the  bone  between  his  teeth, 
and,  taking  care  not  to  be  seen,  made  off  to  hide  it  at 
Simonneau's,  the  greengrocer's  in  the  Rue  des 
Beaux-Arts,  at  whose  shop  he  was  a  regular  visitor. 
Then,  with  an  air  of  assumed  unconcern,  he  returned 
in  Mouton's  direction,  looked  at  him  and,  seeing  that 
he  was  hunting  about  for  his  bone,  began  to  laugh. 

Caire  and  I  loved  each  other  without  being  aware 
of  it,  which  is  a  safe  and  convenient  way  of  loving. 
It  was  about  eight  years  since  we  had  made  our  joint 
appearance  on  this  planet  without  being  quite  sure 
what  we  had  come  there  to  do,  when  my  poor  com- 
panion and  coeval,  who  was  growing  fat  and  wheezy, 
was  seized  with  a  painful  malady,  to  wit,  stone.  He 
bore  his  sufferings  uncomplainingly,  his  coat  became 
dull  and  brittle,  he  grew  low-spirited,  and  would  not 
cat.  The  vet  performed  an  operation  on  him; 
but  it  was  not  a  success.  The  same  evening  the 
patient  ceased  to  suffer.  As  he  lay  in  his  basket  he 
turned  his  fading,  friendly  eyes  towards  me,  got  up, 


LITTLE  PIERRE  221 

gave  just  one  wag  of  his  tail,  and  fell  down  again. 
It  was  all  over  with  him.  And  then  I  knew  how 
much  he  had  been  to  us.  I  realized  what  a  power 
he  had  been  for  us,  how  he  had  wrought  and  thought 
and  loved  and  hated;  in  short,  what  a  great  place  he 
had  held  in  our  household  and  in  our  thoughts.  I 
shed  some  bitter  tears  and  then  fell  asleep.  Next 
morning  I  inquired  whether  Caire's  death  was  in  the 
paper,  like  Marshal  Soult's. 


CHAPTER  XXVII 

THE  DAUGHTER  OF  THE  TROGLODYTES 

|Y  eyes  had  not  deceived  me.  Rade- 
gonde,  or  I  should  say  Justine — for 
my  dear  mamma  had  deliberately 
transferred  her  from  the  patronage 
of  the  noble  Thuringian  to  that  of 
a  saint  with  a  name  that  came  more 
trippingly  off  the  tongue — Justine,  then,  signalized 
her  arrival  by  turning  our  abode  into  a  fairy  dwell- 
ing place.  But  do  not  misconceive  me.  I  do  not 
mean  to  say  that  a  fairy  godmother  had  bestowed 
on  this  simple  peasant  girl  the  power  to  deck  the 
walls  of  the  rooms  she  cleaned  with  porphyry,  gold, 
and  precious  stones.  No.  But,  since  she  had  entered 
upon  her  duties,  our  house  had  become  full  of  weird 
noises;  there  were  alarming  thuds,  panic-stricken 
shrieks,  gnashing  of  teeth,  and  peals  of  laughter. 
The  place  was  filled  with  the  horrible  smell  of  burn- 
ing fat  and  charred  flesh,  water  flowed  amazingly 
about  the  floor,  suddenly  there  would  rise  such 
clouds  of  smoke  as  would  turn  day  into  night  and 
make  us  gasp  for  breath;  floors  creaked,  doors 
slammed,  windows  banged,  curtains  bellied  out,  the 
wind  blew  in  great  gusts  and  there  were  sinister 


222 


LITTLE  PIERRE  223 

portents  that  brought  a  cloud  to  my  father's  brow; 
the  ink  ran  all  over  his  table,  his  pens  lost  their 
nibs,  the  chimney  of  his  lamp  cracked  every  night. 
Surely  this  was  witchcraft,  and  no  mistake.  My 
mother  kept  saying  that  Justine  was  not  really  a 
naughty  girl,  and  that  with  time  and  patience  she 
would  make  a  servant  of  her,  but  that  she  broke 
rather  too  much  in  the  process.  It  was  not  that 
Justine  was  a  clumsy  girl.  My  parents  indeed  were 
often  amazed  at  her  dexterity.  But  she  was  wild, 
headstrong,  and,  as  in  her  primitive  mind  she 
invested  inanimate  objects  with  a  soul  and  imagined 
them  as  being  stirred  by  the  same  feelings  and  pas- 
sions as  men  and  women,  this  daughter  of  the  Trog- 
lodytes of  the  Loire  used  to  struggle  with  the  kitchen 
and  household  utensils  as  though  with  malevolent 
beings.  She  assaulted  the  hardest  metals;  window- 
catches,  and  tap-handles  fell  trophies  to  her  prowess. 
In  a  word,  the  spirit  of  her  remote  forefathers  im- 
bued her  with  the  most  uncouth  fetishism.  But  then 
which  of  us  can  boast  of  never  having  abused  some 
senseless  object  which  hurt  or  merely  got  in  our 
way — a  stone,  a  splinter,  or  a  twig? 

I  observed  Justine,  as  she  went  about  her  daily 
tasks,  with  a  curiosity  that  never  flagged.  My 
mother  upbraided  me  for  what  she  called  my  stupid 
boobyishness.  Therein  she  misjudged  me.  Justine 
interested  me  by  reason  of  her  fighting  spirit  and 
because  all  her  domestic  activities  took  on  the  char- 


224  LITTLE  PIERRE 

acter  of  a  grim  and  doubtful  conflict.  When,  bran- 
dishing her  broom  and  feather  brush,  she  said  in 
resolute  tones,  "I've  got  to  go  and  do  the  drawing- 
room,"  I  followed  eager  and  expectant,  to  see  what 
would  come  of  it. 

The  drawing-room  was  furnished  with  a  sofa  and 
great  mahogany  armchairs  destined  to  receive,  in 
their  capacious  cavities  with  their  shabby  red  plush 
covers,  the  patients  of  my  father,  Dr.  Noziere.  The 
walls  were  hung  with  green;,  striped  paper  and 
adorned  with  two  engravings,  The  Dance  of  the 
Hours  and  Napoleon's  Dream,  as  well  as  with  two 
oil  paintings  cracked  all  over.  They  were  family 
portraits.  One  was  of  my  grand-uncle  and  portrayed 
a  dark  complexioned  man  with  a  very  high  coat  col- 
lar, a  white  cravat  that  concealed  his  chin,  and  shirt 
studs  linked  with  a  small  gold  chain.  The 
other  was  a  grand-aunt.  She  wore  side  curls 
and  her  bust  was  closely  enwrapped  in  a  se- 
vere black  gown.  Both,  I  was  told,  were 
dressed  in  the  style  of  Charles  X.  Painted  a 
short  while  before  their  untimely  death,  these  figures 
of  a  bygone  day  filled  me  with  a  profound  melan- 
choly. But  what  constituted  the  richest  adornment 
of  this  drawing-room  were  the  bronze  statuettes  pre- 
sented to  my  father  as  a  mark  of  gratitude  by  pa- 
tients whom  he  had  cured.  Each  of  these  works  of 
art  was  an  index  to  the  mentality  of  the  donor. 
Some  were  gracious  and  smiling,  others  aloof  and 


LITTLE  PIERRE  225 

austere.  There  was  no  similarity  between  them 
either  in  character  or  workmanship.  On  one  side 
of  the  door  a  little  Venus  de  Milo,  cast  in  chocolate- 
coloured  metal,  stood  on  a  small  Boule  table.  On 
the  other,  a  Flora,  in  common  bronze,  was  smilingly 
waving  a  spray  of  flowers  modelled  in  gilded  zinc. 
Between  two  of  the  windows,  bearded  and  horned, 
sat  the  Moses  of  Michael  Angelo;  and,  here  and 
there,  on  different  tables,  were  to  be  seen  a  young 
Neapolitan  fisherman  holding  up  a  crab  by  one  of 
its  claws,  a  guardian  angel  flying  heavenwards  with 
a  little  child  in  his  arms,  Mignon  weeping  for  her  na- 
tive land,  Mephistopheles  folding  his  bat-like  wings, 
about  him,  and  Joan  of  Arc  in  an  attitude  of  prayer. 
Finally  a  Spartacus,  who  had  broken  his  fetters, 
stood  up  fierce  and  defiant  clenching  his  fists  on  the 
clock  above  the  chimney-piece. 

To  clean  them,  Justine  would  violently  belabour 
pictures  and  bronzes  with  her  stump  of  a  feather 
broom.  This  castigation  did  no  appreciable  damage 
to  my  great  uncle  or  my  great  aunt,  who  had  already 
endured  manifold  hardships,  nor  did  it  have  any  ad- 
verse effect  on  the  simple  rounded  forms  of  the 
Venus  or  the  Moses.  But  the  modern  sculpture 
came  off  badly.  Feathers  torn  violently  from  the 
dusting  implement  got  entangled  beneath  the  wings 
of  the  guardian  angel,  between  the  claws  of  the  crab, 
underneath  Joan  of  Arc's  sword,  in  Mignon's  hair, 
in  Flora's  garland,  and  in  the  chains  of  Spartacus. 


226  LITTLE  PIERRE 

Justine  had  no  love  for  these  gewgaws,  as  she  called 
them,  and  she  held  the  Spartacus  in  especial  detesta- 
tion. It  was, he  to  whom  she  dealt  the  rudest  buf- 
fets. She  made  him  rock  on  his  base.  He  reeled,  he 
gave  a  terrible  lurch  forward  as  though  he  would 
fall  on  the  impious  one  and  crush  her  as  he  fell. 
Then  with  a  fierce  frown,  the  veins  standing  out  on 
her  forehead,  she  would  shout:  "Hola!  Ho!"  as 
though  to  the  cows  she  had  been  wont  to  bring 
home  from  the  fields  at  evening,  and  finally,  with  a 
well  directed  blow,  she  would  knock  him  straight  on 
his  pedestal  again. 

In  these  daily  combats,  the  feather  broom  soon 
shed  all  its  plumage.  There  was  only  the  leather 
handle  and  the  stick  left  for  Justine  to  dust  with. 
The  treatment  soon  brought  the  wings  off  the  guard- 
ian angel.  Joan  of  Arc  lost  her  sword,  the  fisher-lad 
his  crab,  Mignon  a  lock  of  hair,  and  Flora  had  no 
more  flowers  left  to  scatter.  Justine  did  not  let  that 
trouble  her,  but  sometimes,  as  she  gazed  on  the 
havoc  she  had  wrought,  she  would  stand  dreamily, 
with  her  hands  folded  over  the  broom  handle,  and 
murmur  with  a  wistful  smile : 

"What  a  pack  of  duds  they  are,  the  lot  of  them!" 


CHAPTER  XXVIII 

DRAMATIS  PERSONS 

WAS  fond  of  Justine's  company.  My 
mother,  indeed,  thought  I  was  too 
fond  of  it.  When  I  come  to  think 
over  the  causes  of  this  predilection, 
I  find  several  which  testify  to  my 
innocence  and  my  simplicity.  A 
child's  trustfulness,  the  need  for  friendship,  a  love  of 
fun  and  frolic,  and  an  affectionate  disposition,  all  led 
me  to  cultivate  her  society.  But  there  were  other 
considerations,  less  to  my  credit,  that  drew  me  to  this 
daughter  of  the  Troglodytes.  I  thought  her  rather 
a  simpleton,  rather  a  duffer,  and  altogether  be- 
neath me  in  intelligence.  And  so  it  happened  that, 
when  I  was  in  her  company,  I  was  often  provided 
with  occasions  for  self-glorification.  I  greatly  en- 
joyed correcting  and  instructing  her  and  possibly  I 
was  none  too  indulgent  in  the  process.  I  was  some- 
what of  a  quiz,  and  she  gave  me  plenty  of  oppor- 
tunities for  being  quizzical.  I  wanted  to  be  thought 
much  of,  so  I  tried  to  impress  her  with  my  superior- 
ity, and  held  myself  up  to  her  as  an  object  of  admira-. 
tion. 

I  did  my  best  to  shine  before  her,  until  one  day  I 
227 


228  LITTLE  PIERRE 

found  out  that,  so  far  from  admiring  me,  she  looked 
on  me  as  quite  devoid  of  sense  and  judgment,  in 
fact  as  nothing  more  or  less  than  a  noodle,  without 
a  single  strong  point,  in  looks  or  anything  else,  in 
my  favour.  How  did  I  get  to  know  that  she  har- 
boured sentiments  so  diametrically  opposed  to  those 
with  which  I  had  credited  her?  Why,  goodness  me, 
because  she  told  me  so !  Justine  was  crudely  out- 
spoken. She  knew  how  to  make  herself  understood, 
and  I  was  forced  to  recognize  that  she  did  not  ad- 
mire me  in  the  least.  To  my  credit  be  it  said  that  I 
was  not  angry  with  her,  and  that  I  loved  her  but 
little  the  less  in  consequence.  I  diligently  inquired 
into  the  causes  of  so  unlocked  for  a  judgment,  and  I 
succeeded  in  discovering  them,  for,  whatever  the 
daughter  of  the  Troglodytes  might  think  of  me,  I 
was  no  fool.  I  will  report  the  result  of  my  re- 
searches. To  begin  with,  she  beheld  me  thin,  deli- 
cate, and  pale,  not  half  so  sturdy  and  strong  as  her 
brother  Symphorien,  who  was  a  year  younger  than 
I  and  more  of  a  man.  In  her  idea,  a  boy  ought  to 
have  plenty  of  "go"  and  determination,  to  be  a 
dashing,  upstanding  fellow;  and  don't  for  a  moment 
imagine  that  I  disagree  with  her  in  that.  Then, 
although  it  may  seem  strange  that  a  wench  who 
could  not  read  should  hold  such  a  view,  she  looked 
on  me  as  an  ignoramus.  Though  she  did  not 
say  as  much,  I  could  see  she  was  astonished  that 
a  boy  of  my  age  should  be  unacquainted  with 


LITTLE  PIERRE  229 

facts  about  animals  and  Nature  that  her  brother 
Symphorien  had  known  ages  ago.  My  ignorance 
on  certain  subjects  struck  her  as  absurd,  for 
good  girl  as  she  was,  she  was  no  ninny  and  had 
no  respect  for  simpletons.  And  then  again,  al- 
though she  would  sometimes  laugh  enough  to  split 
her  sides,  as  she  would  say,  she  thought  it  a  sign  of 
a  defective  understanding  to  laugh  loudly  at  any- 
thing and  everything,  as  I  was  wont  to  do.  Accord- 
ing to  her  it  argued  a  mistaken  view  of  life,  which 
is  no  laughing  matter,  and  a  lack  of  heart.  Such 
then  were  the  good  and  solid  reasons  which  led  Jus- 
tine to  regard  me  as  devoid  of  understanding. 
And  truly  they  were  good  enough  reasons  in  them- 
selves, although,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  I  was,  for  a 
small  boy,  capable  of  taking  in  a  great  deal.  Some- 
times, however,  I  did  behave  in  a  very  disconcerting 
fashion.  Of  this  I  could  give  a  number  of  instances. 
Here  at  any  rate  is  one  which,  I  fancy,  dates  back  to 
Justine's  early  days  in  our  establishment.  On  a 
what-not  in  the  little  room  with  the  rosebud  wall- 
paper there  used  to  be  some  little  books  bound  in 
green  and  embellished  with  illustrations,  which  my 
dear  mother  sometimes  gave  me  to  read.  They  were 
"The  Child's  Companion."  Berquin's  stories  took 
me  back  to  the  France  of  olden  times  and  acquainted 
me  with  manners  and  customs  very  different  from 
those  of  our  day.  For  example,  I  read  therein  the 
story  of  a  young  nobleman  of  ten  who  wore  a  sword 


230  LITTLE  PIERRE 

which  he  was  too  fond  of  drawing  on  the  little  vil- 
lage children  with  whom  he  chanced  to  quarrel.  But 
one  day,  instead  of  a  blade,  he  drew  from  the  sheath 
a  peacock's  feather  which  his  wise  tutor  had  put 
there  instead.  Picture  to  yourself  his  shame  and 
confusion.  The  lesson  did  him  good.  After  that 
he  was  never  arrogant  and  quarrelsome.  To  me 
these  tales  had  a  certain  element  of  freshness  about 
them ;  they  moved  me  to  tears.  One  morning  I  re- 
member reading  the  tale  of  two  gendarmes  who 
greatly  touched  me  by  their  kindness  and  devotion. 
They  used  to  go  about  bringing  happiness  into  the 
lives  of  poor  peasant  folk — how  they  did  it  I  have 
forgotten — and  the  peasants  invited  them  to  supper. 
As  there  were  no  plates  in  the  cottage,  the  good  gen- 
darmes ate  their  stew  on  their  bread.  That  struck 
me  as  such  a  fine  thing  that  I  made  up  my  mind  to 
copy  them  at  luncheon.  Despite  my  mother's  very 
justifiable  protests,  I  insisted  on  putting  my  haricot 
mutton  on  my  bread.  I  spilt  the  gravy  all  down  my 
clothes,  my  mother  scolded  me  and  Justine  looked  at 
me  with  compassion. 

The  incident  was  a  slight  one.  It  reminds  me  of 
another  one  of  a  similar  nature,  not  less  trivial.  All 
the  same  I  am  going  to  relate  it,  for  it  is  not  great- 
ness that  is  important  to  my  subject,  but  truth. 

I  read  Berquin;  I  also  read  Bouilly.  More  mod- 
ern than  Berquin,  Bouilly  was  not  less  touching.  To 
him  I  owe  my  acquaintance  with  one  Lise  who  sent 


LITTLE  PIERRE  231 

her  pet  sparrow  to  Madame  Helvetius  with  mes- 
sages soliciting  her  favour  on  behalf  of  a  family  that 
had  fallen  on  evil  days.  I  conceived  a  deep,  nay,  a 
violent  affection  for  Lise.  I  asked  my  mother 
whether  she  were  still  alive.  My  mother  replied 
that  she  would  be  very  old  if  she  were.  I  next  be- 
came enamoured  of  a  little  orphan  of  whom  M. 
Bouilly  drew  a  delightful  portrait.  He  was  a  poor 
little  boy  without  shelter  and  half  naked.  An  old 
scholar  took  him  in  and  made  him  work  in  his  li- 
brary. He  gave  him  his  old  clothes  to  wear,  nice 
warm  things,  which  had  to  be  altered  a  little  to  make 
them  fit.  That  is  the  part  I  liked  best  in  the  story. 
I  longed  for  nothing  so  much  as  to  be  dressed  like 
Bouilly's  little  orphan  boy,  in  a  man^s  old  clothes.  I 
asked  my  father  and  my  godfather  for  theirs,  but 
they  only  made  fun  of  me.  One  day,  when  I  was  at 
home  alone,  I  lighted  in  the  depths  of  a  cupboard 
on  a  frock-coat  that  seemed  to  have  seen  its  best 
days.  I  put  it  on  and  went  to  look  at  myself  in  the 
glass.  It  trailed  on  the  ground  and  the  sleeves 
came  down  over  my  hands.  So  far,  there  was  no 
great  harm  done,  but,  in  order,  I  fancy,  to  conform 
to  the  story  in  all  its  details,  I  curtailed  the  coat 
a  little  with  the  scissors.  The  consequence  was  that 
I  found  myself  with  a  very  awkward  piece  of  busi- 
ness on  hand.  Aunt  Chausson  went  out  of  her  way 
on  this  occasion  to  credit  me  with  perverted  instincts; 
my  mother  rebuked  me  for  what  she  inappropriately 


232  LITTLE  PIERRE 

termed  my  mischievous  monkey-tricks.  I  was  misun- 
derstood. What  I  wanted  was  to  be  a  gendarme  a  la 
Berquln,  an  orphan  a  la  Bouilly,  to  play  a  variety  of 
characters,  to  live  several  lives.  I  was  giving  vent 
to  a  burning  desire  to  get  out  of  myself,  to  be  some 
one  else,  several  other  persons,  every  other  person, 
had  that  been  possible,  all  humanity,  the  whole  nat- 
ural world;  whereof  there  only  remains  with  me  the 
rather  unusual  faculty  of  entering  into  other  people's 
points  of  view,  of  forming  a  good,  occasionally  a 
too  good,  estimate  of  the  arguments  and  opinions  of 
my  opponents.  It  was  this  latter  trait  that  convinced 
Justine  beyond  all  manner  of  doubt  that  I  was  not 
right  in  my  head.  In  fact,  she  soon  came  to  look  on 
me  as  a  dangerous  idiot. 

When  I  came  to  learn  the  stories  of  the  Crusades, 
the  lofty  exploits  of  the  Christian  barons  fired  me 
with  enthusiasm.  It  is  good  to  imitate  the  things  you 
admire.  In  order  to  be  as  much  as  possible  like 
Godefroy  de  Bouillon,  I  fashioned  myself  a  suit  of 
armour  and  a  helmet  out  of  some  cardboard  on 
which  I  had  gummed  pieces  of  the  silver  paper  that 
chocolates  are  wrapped  in.  To  critics  who  point  out 
that  such  a  suit  was  more  like  the  burnished  armour 
of  the  fifteenth  century  than  the  coats  of  mail  of 
the  twelfth  and  thirteenth,  I  would  deliberately  re- 
ply that  more  than  one  illustrious  painter  has  been, 
guilty  of  far  more  serious  liberties  in  this  respect. 
At  all  events,  the  really  essential  part  of  my  outfit 


LITTLE  PIERRE  233 

consisted,  as  will  presently  but  too  plainly  appear,  in 
a  double-bladed  axe  cut  out  of  cardboard  and  fixed 
on  to  the  end  of  an  old  sunshade  handle. 

The  kitchen  represented  Jerusalem,  and  I  took  it 
by  storm.  I  also  belaboured  Justine  who,  while 
lighting  the  kitchen  fire,  had  to  be  an  infidel,  much 
against  her  will.  The  faith  that  clothed  me  like  a 
robe  of  fire  lent  might  to  my  arm.  Justine  was  not 
made  of  cotton  wool,  she  was  indeed,  as  she  herself 
was  wont  to  remark,  "a  tough  'un,"  and  she  would 
have  endured  the  onslaught  of  the  two-bladed  axe 
with  equanimity  had  it  not  become  entangled  with 
her  cap.  Now  this  cap  of  hers  she  looked  upon  as 
something  beyond  all  price,  not  only  because  of  its 
pleasing  shape  and  its  valuable  lace,  but  for  reasons 
of  a  deeper  and  more  mysterious  import — because  it 
was,  perhaps,  for  her  an  emblem  of  her  native  place, 
a  symbol  of  her  country,  the  insignia  of  the  daugh- 
ters of  the  land  she  loved.  She  looked  on  it  as  some- 
thing august,  something  sacred.  And,  now,  behold 
her  bereft  of  it  in  most  ignoble  fashion.  She  heard 
it  give.  But  with  the  same  blow  I  had  done  worse 
still :  I  had  disarranged  Justine's  chignon. 

With  the  virgin  shyness  of  some  timid  wild  crea- 
ture she  would  not  suffer  anything,  not  even  a  moth- 
er's hand,  not  even  a  breath  of  air,  to  interfere  with 
the  arrangement  of  her  hair,  which  with  its  narrow 
plaits  patted  tightly  down  was  unbecoming  enough  in 
all  conscience.  Never  on  any  occasion  had  she  been 


234  LITTLE  PIERRE 

discovered  with  her  hair  down,  not  even  during 
an  illness  which  kept  her  six  weeks  in  bed  in  her  own 
room,  when  my  mother  went  every  day  to  make  her 
comfortable ;  not  even  on  that  night  of  terror  when 
some  one  shouted  "Fire"  and  the  concierge  saw  her 
rushing  across  the  court  with  bare  feet,  in  her  night- 
dress, her  hair  in  the  most  perfect  order.  To  pre- 
serve this  unvarying  mode  of  coiffure  was  for  her  a 
matter  of  honour,  of  glory,  nay  of  conscience.  A 
single  hair  out  of  place  would  have  been  a  disgrace. 
As  she  felt  these  blows  raining  down  on  her  cap  and 
headgear,  Justine  shook  all  over  and  put  her  hands 
to  her  head.  She  was  loath  to  believe  the  full  extent 
of  her  misfortune.  She  was  obliged  to  feel  about  the 
nape  of  her  neck  three  times  before  she  could  con- 
vince herself  that  her  cap  had  been  battered  in  and 
her  coiffure  profaned.  But  the  evidence  was  too  hor- 
ribly convincing.  There  was  a  hole  in  the  lace  big 
enough  to  put  your  finger  through,  and  a  wisp  of 
hair  about  as  long  and  as  thick  as  a  rat's  tail  was 
hanging  down  her  back.  Thereupon  the  heart 
of  Justine  was  filled  with  an  exceeding  bitter  sor- 
row. 

"I  shan't  stop  any  longer,"  she  cried  in  doleful 
tones. 

She  asked  no  redress,  for  the  outrage  was  ir- 
reparable, and  without  wasting  words  in  vain  re- 
proaches, without  so  much  as  a  glance  in  my  direc- 
tion, she  went  out  of  the  kitchen.  My  mother  had 


LITTLE  PIERRE  235 

all  the  difficulty  in  the  world  to  get  her  to  change  her 
mind.  There  is  no  doubt  that  the  daughter  of  the 
Troglodytes  would  never  have  resumed  her  apron  if, 
on  reflexion,  she  had  not  come  to  the  conclusion  that 
her  young  master  was  more  of  a  fool  than  a  knave. 


CHAPTER  XXIX 

MADEMOISELLE   MERELLE 

N  those  days,  if  I  mistake  not,  there 
was  a  gentleness  about  life,  a  certain 
air  of  good  fellowship  about  men 
and  things,  an  atmosphere  of  in- 
timate and  gracious  charm  that  to- 
day exists  no  longer.  It  seems  to 
me  as  though  people  were  nearer  to  one  another 
then,  or,  perhaps,  it  was  because  I  was  a  child 
and  tender-hearted,  that  they  seemed  to  be 
more  closely  united  one  to  another.  Be  that  as 
it  may,  you  might  have  seen  many  a  morning,  in 
the  courtyard  of  the  house  where  I  was  born,  M. 
Bellaguet,  in  his  Turkish  cap  and  check  dress- 
ing-gown, having  a  friendly  chat  with  M.  Morin, 
who  was  the  concierge  next  door  and  an  em- 
ploye at  the  Chamber  of  Deputies.  Whoever  did 
not  see  them  thus,  missed  a  fine  sight,  for  the  pair 
of  them  typified,  as  it  were,  the  regime  inaugurated 
by  the  Trois  Glorieuses.  However,  the  misfortune 
is  not  irremediable,  for  you  may  get  the  two  charac- 
ters repeated  a  hundred  times  over  in  Daumier's 
lithographs.  In  short*  everybody  knew  everybody 

else  m  those  days,  and  when  three  o'clock  in  the  af- 

236 


LITTLE  PIERRE  237 

ternoon  came  round  and  my  mother  was  sitting  at 
the  window  sewing,  with  a  pot  of  mignonette  in  front 
of  her,  she  would  exclaim,  as  she  glanced  down  at 
the  glass  roof  above  the  steps: 

"There's  Mademoiselle  Merelle  going  to  give 
her  grammar  lesson  to  M.  Bellaguet's  little  girl. 
Mademoiselle  Merelle  is  charming,  and  her  man- 


ners are  so  nice." 


It  was  generally  held  that  Mademoiselle  Merelle 
was  a  lady  and  that  she  always  dressed  in  good  taste. 
If  I  was  haphazard,  in  describing  her  dress,  I 
should  depict  her  for  you  in  the  fashion  of  the 
present  day.  I  believe  it  is  always  the  way.  As 
time  goes  on  we  re-array  the  young  women  we 
used  to  know  in  clothes  of  the  latest  mode.  It  is  the 
same  thing  on  the  stage  with  plays  that  have  seen 
ten,  fifteen,  or  twenty  years  go  by.  Every  time 
they  are  revived,  the  heroine's  gowns  are  brought 
up  to  date.  But  I  have  the  historic  sense  and  a  lik- 
ing for  the  things  of  old.  I  shall,  therefore,  care- 
fully eschew  those  modernizing  practices  that  change 
the  physiognomy  of  an  epoch,  and  so  I  here  put  it 
on  record  that  Mademoiselle  Merelle,  then  about 
twenty-six  or  twenty-seven,  wore  leg  of  mutton 
sleeves,  and  that  her  skirt,  unlike  those  of  the  pres- 
ent day,  grew  wider  as  it  went  down.  She  wore  a 
cashmere  scarf  wrapped  tightly  across  her  chest,  and 
she  had,  as  the  saying  went,  a  wasp-like  waist.  I 
nearly  forgot  to  say  that  long  side  curls  adorned  her 


238  LITTLE  PIERRE 

cheeks  with  their  golden  ringlets,  and  that  she  wore 
according  to  the  season  a  bonnet  of  velvet  or  Leg- 
horn, a  poke  bonnet,  which  projected  so  far  forward 
as  completely  to  conceal  her  profile.  To  put  it 
briefly,  she  was  the  last  word  in  fashion. 

Now,  at  the  time  of  which  I  am  speaking,  I  was 
eight  years  old.  My  stock  of  knowledge  was  scanty, 
but  it  came  from  a  good  source.  It  was  my  mother 
who  had  imparted  it  to  me.  It  included  reading, 
writing  and  arithmetic.  I  wrote  and  spelt  pretty 
well  for  my  age,  so  they  said,  except  for  the  par- 
ticiples. My  mother  as  a  child  had  conceived  a 
mortal  dread  of  participles.  She  had  never  got  over 
it,  and  she  took  good  care  not  to  lead  me  into  gram- 
matical mazes  in  which  she  was  apprehensive  that 
she  herself  might  lose  her  way.  My  mother,  dear 
soul,  was  the  only  one  of  them  all  who  credited  me 
with  brains.  Every  one  else,  including  my  father  and 
my  nurse,  looked  on  me  as  rather  an  ordinary  child, 
intelligent  enough  in  a  way,  but  not  the  way  of  other 
children.  I  was  of  a  more  speculative  turn,  and, 
being  occupied  with  things  of  more  varied  range 
and  greater  diversity,  my  mind  seemed  less  compact 
and  less  collected  than  theirs.  My  parents  thought 
me  too  young  and  too  delicate  to  go  to  boarding 
school,  and  they  had  no  very  high  opinion  of  the  lit- 
tle academies  round  about,  which  they  rightly  con- 
sidered as  dirty  and  ill-managed.  My  father  came 
home  with  a  specially  bad  impression  of  an  estab- 


LITTLE  PIERRE  239 

lishment  in  the  Rue  des  Marais-Saint-Germain  which 
he  had  been  to  see.  At  the  far  end  of  a  dirty,  stuffy 
room  sat  an  apoplectic  dominie  puffing  and  panting 
with  corpulence  and  choler.  He  had  some  dozen  ur- 
chins, all  wearing  dunce's  caps,  kneeling  in  front  of 
his  chair,  and  he  was  threatening  the  rest  of  the 
class  with  the  birch — thirty  little  ragamuffins  who, 
laughing,  crying,  and  yelling  all  together,  were  en- 
gaged in  throwing  their  inkpots,  their  satchels,  and 
their  books  at  each  others'  heads. 

In  these  circumstances,  my  mother  conceived  the 
idea  of  getting  Mademoiselle  Merelle  to  act  as  my 
governess — the  celebrated  Mademoiselle  Pauline 
Merelle  herself.  The  enterprise  was  ambitious  and 
fraught  with  considerable  difficulty.  Mademoiselle 
Merelle  only  taught  in  the  houses  of  the  nobility  or 
of  such  middle-class  families  as  were  rolling  in 
money.  They  had  to  be  either  rich  or  titled  people. 
She  was  the  protegee  of  old  Bellaguet,  our  landlord, 
who  had  married  one  of  his  daughters  to  a  Vil- 
leragues  and  another  to  a  Monsaigle,  and  there 
were  doubts  as  to  whether  she  would  consent  to 
teach  the  son  of  an  obscure  little  local  doctor.  For 
my  father  was  poor,  and  his  rooted  dislike  to  ac- 
cepting fees  was  not  calculated  to  make  him  rich, 
to  say  nothing  of  the  fact  that,  being  of  a  meditative 
disposition,  he  spent,  in  reflecting  on  the  destiny  of 
humankind,  valuable  hours  which,  had  he  been  less 
of  a  genius,  he  would  have  devoted  to  looking  after 


240  LITTLE  PIERRE 

his  worldly  affairs.  Thus  Dr.  Noziere  was  rich  only 
in  sentiments  and  ideas.  My  mother,  who  was  nev- 
ertheless anxious  to  have  me  taught  by  Mademoiselle 
Merelle,  persuaded  Madame  Montet,  the  cashier  at 
the  Petit-Saint-Thomas,  to  say  a  word  to  her. 
Madame  Montet  was  a  patient  of  my  father's,  and 
was  said  to  be  a  great  friend  of  Mademoiselle  Mer- 
elle's  mother.  The  latter  was  a  great  churchgoer, 
was  everlastingly  to  be  seen  carrying  a  horse-hair 
reticule,  and  looked  more  like  her  daughter's  maid 
than  her  mother.  So,  at  least,  I  have  heard,  for  I 
never  saw  her  myself. 

Through  the  good  offices  of  Madame  Montet,  the 
young  governess  consented  to  take  me  every  day, 
from  one  to  two  o'clock. 

"Pierre,  Mademoiselle  Merelle  will  give  you 
your  first  lesson  to-morrow,"  said  my  mother,  with 
a  restrained  joy,  in  which  a  note  of  pride  could  be 
detected. 

On  hearing  this  I  went  to  bed  in  such  a  state 
of  excitement  that  it  was  at  least  ten  mintues  be- 
fore I  fell  asleep,  and  I  believe  I  dreamt  about  it. 

Next  morning,  my  mother  made  me  dress  with 
greater  care  than  usual.  She  put  pomade  on  my 
hair  and  parted  it  herself,  and  I  put  on  more  pomade 
on  my  own  account,  after  she  had  gone.  I  should 
have  washed  my  hands  again  had  I  not  known  from 
experience  that  it  was  useless  and  that,  do  what  one 
will,  little  boys'  hands  are  never  anything  but  dirty. 


LITTLE  PIERRE  241 

Mademoiselle  Merelle  came  at  the  appointed 
hour.  She  came,  and  lo,  all  the  rooms  were  pervaded 
with  the  scent  of  heliotrope !  My  mother  conducted 
us  both  into  the  little  room  with  the  rosebud  wall  pa- 
per, next  to  her  own.  She  installed  us  at  a  little 
mahogany  side  table  and,  having  promised  that  no 
one  should  disturb  us,  she  withdrew. 

Forthwith  Mademoiselle  Merelle  unfastened  a 
dainty  little  Russia  leather  writing-case,  took  from 
it  a  sheet  of  notepaper  and  a  pen-holder  made  of 
a  porcupine  quill  with  a  silver  knob  at  the  end,  and 
began  to  write.  She  wrote  very  rapidly  and  only 
paused  now  and  then  to  look  up  at  the  ceiling  and 
smile,  and  to  tell  me  to  read  La  Fontaine's  fables, 
which  happened  to  be  lying  on  the  table.  In  this 
manner  we  got  through  the  first  lesson,  and  when 
my  mother  asked  me  if  Mademoiselle  Merelle  had 
made  me  work  hard  I  said  yes,  without  quite 
realizing  that  I  was  not  exactly  telling  the  truth. 

The  following  day,  when  we  had  again  seated 
ourselves  at  the  little  table,  my  governess  once  more 
told  me  to  get  on  with  a  fable  what  time  she  herself 
continued  writing  in  a  sort  of  seraphic  rapture. 
Sometimes  she  stopped  as  though  waiting  for  an  in- 
spiration, and,  whenever  by  chance  her  gaze  rested 
on  me,  her  expression  betokened  mild  and  tranquil 
indifference.  The  third  lesson  passed  off  in  the 
same  manner,  and  so  did  those  which  followed.  I 
sat  and  feasted  my  eyes  upon  her.  During  the  three- 


242  LITTLE  PIERRE 

quarters  of  an  hour  that  the  lesson  lasted,  I  drank 
in  the  light  of  her  eyes.  To  me  those  eyes  of  hers 
seemed  a  wondrous  marvel,  and  even  now,  after  all 
these  years,  a  marvel  I  still  believe  they  were.  They 
seemed  as  though  fashioned  of  Parma  violets.  Long 
lashes  lent  them  mystery  and  shadow.  No  detail  of 
that  pretty  face  have  I  forgotten.  Mademoiselle 
Merelle's  nostrils  were  rather  wide  apart,  pink  in- 
side, like  a  kitten's ;  her  mouth  curved  upwards  a  lit- 
tle at  the  corners,  and  there  was  a  slight  down  on  her 
lip  whereof  my  juvenile  organs  of  vision,  magnify- 
ing like  a  lens,  seemed  to  distinguish  each  infinites- 
imal separate  hair.  The  leisure  thus  bestowed  on 
me  by  my  governess  was  employed,  not  in  reading 
La  Fontaine's  fables,  as  she  recommended  me,  but  in 
contemplating  her  and  in  wondering  to  myself  what 
manner  of  letters  she  could  be  writing;  and  I  was 
convinced  that  they  were  love-letters.  Therein  I  was 
right,  save  that  at  that  time  Mademoiselle  Merelle's 
ideas  and  mine,  regarding  the  nature  of  love,  did  not 
precisely  coincide.  Having  further  speculated  as 
to  who  the  people  were  to  whom  she  used  to  write, 
I  conjectured  that  they  must  be  angels  in  Paradise, 
not  that  the  supposition  seemed  very  probable  even 
in  my  own  eyes,  but  it  spared  me  the  pangs  of  jeal- 
ousy. 

Mademoiselle  Merelle  never  spoke  a  word  to 
me.  I  heard  the  sound  of  her  voice  when  she  read 
over  some  of  the  phrases  she  had  written,  some- 


LITTLE  PIERRE  243 

times  in  tones  of  gentle  melancholy,  sometimes  of 
sparkling  glee.  I  was  unable  to  catch  their  mean- 
ing. I  remember,  however,  that  she  used  to  speak 
of  flowers  and  birds,  of  the  stars,  and  the  ivy  which 
dies  on  that  round  which  it  winds  its  tendrils.  The 
tones  of  her  voice  awoke  responsive  music  in  my 
heart. 

Now  my  mother's  awe  concerning  participles  was 
really  nothing  more  nor  less  than  superstition.  From 
time  to  time  she  would  inquire  whether  we  had 
reached  that  part  of  the  grammar,  as  in  her  view  it 
was  the  most  puzzling  and  difficult  of  all,  particu- 
larly the  distinction  between  the  verbal  adjective 
and  the  present  participle.  I  replied  vaguely  and  in 
such  terms  that  she  worried  herself  with  the  thought 
that  perhaps  I  was  not  quite  so  bright  as  I  might  have 
been.  But  how  was  I  to  tell  her  that  all  I  took  in 
from  Mademoiselle  Merelle  were  her  eyes,  her  lips, 
her  fair  hair,  her  perfume,  her  gentle  breathing,  the 
soft  rustle  of  her  dress,  and  the  sound  of  her  pen  as 
it  sped  over  the  paper. 

I  never  grew  tired  of  gazing  at  my  governess,  but 
I  admired  her  most  of  all  when,  pausing  in  her  writ- 
ing, a  wistful  look  came  into  her  eyes,  and  she  would 
sit,  deep  in  thought,  with  the  silver  ball  of  her  pen- 
holder resting  on  her  nether  lip.  In  after  years, 
when  I  saw — in  the  Museum  at  Naples — that  pic- 
ture from  Pompeii  which  portrays,  in  the  form  of  a 
medallion,  a  poetess,  a  Muse  with  her  style  resting 


244  LITTLE  PIERRE 

on  her  lip  in  precisely  the  same  manner,  I  felt  a  thrill 
as  I  thought  of  those  delicious  hours  of  childhood.* 
Yes,  I  loved  Mademoiselle  Merelle,  and  what 
made  her  nearly  as  adorable  in  my  eyes  as  her 
beauty  was  her  indifference,  her  infinite  and  divine 
indifference.  My  governess  never  spoke  a  word  to 
me,  never  vouchsafed  me  a  smile;  never  bestowed 
on  me  a  word  of  praise  or  blame.  Perhaps,  if  she 
had  shown  the  least  symptom  of  kindness  the  spell 
would  have  been  broken.  But  during  the  ten  months 
that  I  had  lessons  with  her,  she  never  displayed  the 
smallest  interest  in  me.  Sometimes,  with  the  inno- 
cent audacity  of  my  age,  I  attempted  to  kiss  her;  I 
stroked  her  rich  dress,  glossy  as  a  bird's  plumage, 
I  endeavoured  to  sit  on  her  knee.  She  just  put  me 
aside  as  though  I  had  been  a  puppy,  with  never  so 
much  as  a  reproachful  or  warning  word.  And  so, 
feeling  she  was  inaccessible,  I  rarely  indulged  in 
such  manifestations.  Nearly  all  the  time  I  was  in 
her  company,  I  was  in  a  condition  bordering  on 
idiocy  and  sunk  deep  in  a  state  of  gaping  beatitude. 
When  I  was  but  eight  years  old  I  made  proof  that  he 
is  the  happy  man  who,  having  abandoned  mental  ef- 
fort and  the  attempt  to  arrive  at  an  intellectual  un- 
derstanding of  things,  loses  himself  in  the  contem- 

•  Without  doubt  she  was  a  Muse.  But  in  the  same  museum  there 
is  another  Pompeian  painting  representing  the  wife  of  Proculus, 
the  baker,  with  her  style  in  the  same  position  and  her  household  ac- 
count book. 


LITTLE  PIERRE  245 

plation  of  the  beautiful;  and  it  was  revealed  to  me 
that  unbounded  desire,  desire  that  knows  neither 
fear  nor  hope,  desire  that  is  unconscious  of  its  own 
existence,  brings  to  the  mind  and  to  the  senses  the 
very  consummation  of  happiness,  for  it  is  unto  itself 
entire  contentment  and  its  own  complete  satisfaction. 
But  that  is  a  truth  that  I  had  quite  forgotten  by  the 
time  I  was  eighteen,  and  I  have  never  been  able 
thoroughly  to  recapture  it  since.  I  used  then  to 
remain  stock  still  in  contemplation  of  her,  my  fists 
dug  well  into  my  cheeks,  and  my  eyes  wide  open  with 
wonder.  When  at  length  I  awoke  from  my  trance 
(for  after  all  I  did  awake  from  it)  I  gave  evidence 
of  this  reawakening  of  mind  and  body  by  kicking 
the  table  and  making  blots  on  the  fables  of  La 
Fontaine.  But  it  only  needed  a  look  from  Mademoi- 
selle Merelle  to  plunge  me  once  again  into  a  condi- 
tion of  beatific  coma.  That  look  of  hers,  devoid 
alike  of  love  and  hate,  was  always  enough  to  deprive 
me  of  sense  and  motion. 

When  she  departed,  I  used  to  go  down  on  my 
knees  in  front  of  her  chair.  It  was  a  little  ebony 
chair  in  the  style  of  Louis  Philippe,  intended  to  look 
like  Gothic.  The  back  was  shaped  like  a  pointed 
arch.  The  seat  was  upholstered  in  fine  tapestry  and 
represented  a  spaniel  on  a  red  cushion,  and  this  chair 
I  looked  on  as  the  most  beautiful  thing  in  the  world 
when  Mademoiselle  Merelle  was  seated  on  it.  But, 
truth  to  tell,  my  meditations  used  not  to  last  long, 


246  LITTLE  PIERRE 

and  I  turned  from  the  rosebud-papered  study,  skip- 
ping and  jumping  and  shouting  at  the  top  of  my 
voice.  My  mother  told  me  that  I  was  never  so 
noisy  as  in  those  days,  and  it  is  a  family  tradition 
that  I  used  to  run  Justine  very  close  in  the  produc- 
tion of  disasters.  While  the  little  maid  was  out  in 
the  kitchen  smashing  up  the  crockery,  I  set  fire  to  the 
green  lamp-shade  with  the  Chinese  figures  on  it, 
which  my  father  thought  so  much  of  and  which  had 
been  with  us  so  long  that  it  had  come  to  be  looked 
on  as  immortal.  Sometimes  we  were  partners,  Jus- 
tine and  I,  in  the  same  cataclysm,  as  happened  on 
the  day  when,  each  holding  a  bottle,  we  fell  from  top 
to  bottom  of  the  cellar  stairs,  and  again  on  that 
tragic  morning  when,  being  both  engaged  in  water- 
ing the  flowers  on  the  window  ledge,  we  dropped  the 
watering  pot  right  on  to  M.  Bellaguet's  head.  It 
was  at  this  period,  too,  that  my  passion  for  lead  sol- 
diers was  at  its  height.  I  used  eagerly  to  arrange 
them  in  order  of  battle  on  the  dining-room  table, 
and  there  I  fought  the  most  terrible  battles  despite 
the  remonstrances  of  Justine,  anxious  perhaps  to  lay 
the  cloth,  who,  when  I  persisted  in  my  refusal  to 
pack  away  my  fighting  men  in  their  boxes,  would, 
despite  my  clamorous  protests,  sweep  them  all  off, 
victors  and  vanquished  alike,  into  her  apron.  To 
pay  her  out  I  hid  her  work-box  in  the  oven,  and  did 
my  level  best  to  bedevil  the  guileless  creature.  In  a 
word  I  was  a  genuine  boy,  the  real  unadulterated 


LITTLE  PIERRE  247 

article,  a  merry  restless  little  animal  up  to  any  piece 
of  mischief.  It  is,  nevertheless,  true  that  Made- 
moiselle Merelle  exercised  an  irresistible  power  over 
me,  and  that  the  sight  of  her  acted  upon  me  like  one 
of  those  magic  spells  we  read  of  in  Eastern  tales  of 
mystery. 

Now  it  came  to  pass  that  one  day  at  dinner,  after 
ten  months  of  this  enchanted  existence,  my  mother 
informed  me  that  my  governess  was  not  coming  any 
more. 

"Mademoiselle  Merelle,"  went  on  my  mother, 
"told  me  to-day  that  you  had  made  sufficient  prog- 
ress to  go  to  school  after  the  holidays." 

The  marvel  is  that  I  received  this  news  without 
amazement,  without  despair,  almost  without  regret. 
It  did  not  surprise  me.  On  the  contrary,  it  seemed 
natural  that  the  apparition  should,  after  the  manner 
of  apparitions,  fade  away.  This,  at  any  rate,  is  the 
only  explanation  I  can  offer  of  my  imperturbability. 
Mademoiselle  Merelle  was  already  so  remote  from 
my  sphere,  even  when  she  was  with  me,  that  I  was 
able  to  endure  the  thought  of  her  going  away  alto- 
gether. And,  besides,  little  boys  of  eight  have  no 
great  faculty  for  sustained  feelings  of  suffering  and 
regret. 

"Thanks  to  your  governess's  tuition,"  pursued  my 
mother,  "you  now  know  enough  French  grammar  to 
go  straight  into  the  second  form.  I  feel  truly  grate- 
ful to  that  charming  young  woman  for  teaching  you 


248  LITTLE  PIERRE 

the  rules  about  participles.  They  are  the  most  dif- 
ficult part  of  speech  in  our  language,  and  unfortu- 
nately I  was  never  able  to  master  them,  for  I  was 
never  properly  grounded." 

My  dear  mother  was  labouring  under  a  delusion. 
No,  Mademoiselle  Merelle  did  not  teach  me  the  par- 
ticiples, but  she  revealed  to  me  truths  still  more 
precious,  secrets  still  more  valuable.  She  initiated 
me  into  the  cult  of  all  things  gracious  and  comely; 
by  her  indifference  she  taught  me  to  love  beauty  even 
when  it  was  unresponsive  and  remote,  to  love  it 
with  detachment,  an  art  that  is  sometimes  necessary 
in  this  life. 

I  ought  to  let  Mademoiselle  Merelle's  story  con- 
clude there.  I  know  not  what  evil  spirit  it  is  that 
compels  me  to  spoil  the  ending.  Anyhow,  I  won't 
waste  words  in  doing  so.  Mademoiselle  Merelle 
did  not  remain  a  governess.  She  went  to  live  on 
Lake  Como  with  young  Villeragues,  who  did  not 
marry  her  himself.  He  married  her  instead  to  his 
uncle  Monsaigle,  so  that  in  this  respect  her  destiny 
resembled  Lady  Hamilton's.  But  it  flowed  in  ob- 
scurer and  more  tranquil  channels.  I  had  several 
opportunities  of  seeing  her  again,  but  I  studiously 
avoided  them. 


CHAPTER  XXX 

DIVINE  MADNESS 

BOUT  this  time,  at  the  close  of  a  fine 
summer's  day,  I  was  seated  near  the 
window  turning  over  the  leaves  of 
my  picture  Bible.  It  was  very  old 
and  very  tattered,  and  the  en- 
gravings being  in  a  hard  pompous 
style,  though  they  sometimes  excited  my  surprise, 
did  not  charm  me,  for  they  lacked  that  gentleness 
without  which  nothing  ever  gave  me  pleasure. 
There  was  only  one  picture  which  I  liked,  and 
that  was  of  a  lady  wearing  a  very  small 
head-dress,  her  hair  flat  and  smooth  on  the 
crown  of  her  head,  puffed  out  over  the  ears, 
ana  done  up  behind  in  the  form  of  a  ball.  She  was 
very  daintily  decked  out  in  the  style  of  Louis  XIII. 
She  wore  a  lace  collar  and,  standing  on  an  Italian  ter- 
race, was  offering  a  tall  beaker  filled  with  water  to 
Jesus  Christ.  I  was  contemplating  this  dame  who 
seemed  beautiful  to  me;  I  was  meditating  upon  the 
mysterious  scene,  and  above  all  I  was  admiring  the 
beaker  because  of  its  graceful  contour  and  the  dia- 
mond points  which  adorned  its  foot.  And  I  was  full 
of  the  desire  to  possess  such  a  glass  when  my  mother 

called  me  and  said: 

249 


250  LITTLE  PIERRE 

"Pierre,  to-morrow  we  will  go  and  see  Melanie. 
That  will  please  you,  I  expect?" 

Yes,  I  was  pleased.  It  was  now  more  than  two 
years  since  Melanie  had  left  us  to  go  and  live  in  re- 
tirement with  her  niece,  the  wife  of  a  farmer  at 
Jouy-en-Josas.  At  first  I  had  fervently  longed  to 
see  my  old  nurse,  and  I  begged  and  prayed  my  dear 
mamma  to  take  me  to  her.  As  time  went  on  my 
longing  began  to  diminish,  and  now  I  had  grown 
used  to  not  seeing  her,  and  the  memory  of  her,  al- 
ready remote,  was  dimmer  in  my  heart.  Yes,  cer- 
tainly I  was  pleased,  but,  truth  to  tell,  it  was  the 
thought  of  the  journey  that  pleased  me  most.  With 
my  old  Bible  open  on  my  knees,  I  fell  to  thinking 
of  Melanie  and  reproaching  myself  for  my  ingrati- 
tude. I  strove  to  love  her  as  I  had  used  to  do.  I 
drew  the  picture  of  her  from  the  deeps  of  my  heart 
where  it  lay  inurned.  I  rubbed  it  up  and  burnished 
it,  and  managed  to  impart  to  it  the  aspect  of  some- 
thing a  little  the  worse  for  wear  perhaps,  but,  never- 
theless, clean  and  well  cared  for. 

At  dinner,  seeing  my  mother  drinking  out  of  a 
commonish  sort  of  glass,  I  said: 

"Mamma,  when  I  am  grown  up  I  will  give  you  a 
beautiful  glass  as  tall  as  a  flower  vase  with  a  taper- 
ing stem,  like  the  one  I  saw  in  an  old  engraving 
which  represents  a  lady  handing  a  glass  of  water  to 
Jesus  Christ." 

"I  take  the  will  for  the  deed,  Pierre,"  said  my 


LITTLE  PIERRE  251 

mother,  "but  we  have  got  to  think  about  taking  a 
cake  for  poor  old  Melanie,  who  is  so  fond  of  sweet 
things." 

We  went  by  train  to  Versailles ;  when  we  arrived 
at  the  station  we  found  a  covered  cart  waiting  for 
us.  It  was  drawn  by  a  lame  horse  and  driven  by  a 
lad  with  a  wooden  leg.  We  drove  to  Jouy  across 
a  valley  with  streamlets  winding  through  meadows 
and  orchards,  and  shadowy  woods  crowning  the 
summits  of  the  hills. 

"This  is  a  pretty  road,"  said  my  mother.  "No 
doubt  it  was  still  prettier  in  the  spring  when  the 
pears,  cherries  and  peaches  were  all  in  blossom, 
bouquets  of  white,  warmed  and  brightened  with  pink. 
But  then  only  pale,  shy  flowers  would  have  been 
found  among  the  grass,  crowfoot  and  meadow  dais- 
ies. The  summer  flowers  are  bolder;  rose  campion, 
cornflowers,  larkspur,  poppies;  see  how  they  flash 
their  colours  back  at  the  sun!" 

I  was  delighted  with  everything  I  saw.  We  ar- 
rived at  the  farm  and  found  Madame  Denizot  in 
the  yard,  standing  by  a  manure  heap  with  a  stable 
fork  in  her  hand. 

She  ushered  us  into  the  smoke  blackened  kitchen 
where  Melanie,  seated  at  the  chimney  corner  in  a 
tall  wooden  arm-chair,  roughly  padded  with  straw,, 
was  knitting  with  blue  coloured  wool.  A  swarm  of 
flies  buzzed  and  circled  about  her.  A  saucepan 
hummed  a  tune  on  the  hearth.  As  we  came  in, 


252  LITTLE  PIERRE 

Melanie  made  an  effort  to  rise.  My  mother  put 
her  arm  about  her  affectionately,  and  made  her  keep 
her  seat.  We  exchanged  kisses.  My  lips  sank  into 
her  soft  cheeks.  She  moved  her  lips,  but  no  words 
came. 

"Poor  old  soul,"  said  Madame  Denizot,  "she's 
got  out  of  the  way  of  talking.  It's  not  to  be  won- 
dered at,  she  has  very  little  call  to  do  any  talking 
here." 

Melanie  wiped  her  misty  eyes  with  a  corner  of  her 
apron.  She  smiled  on  us  and  her  tongue  was  loos- 
ened: 

"Gracious  goodness,  and  can  it  be  you,  Madame 
Noziere?  You  haven't  altered,  and  how  your  little 
Pierre  has  grown ;  grown  out  of  all  knowledge  1  The 
dear  child  is  pushing  us  into  the  next  world." 

She  asked  for  my  father,  such  a  fine  looking  man 
and  so  kind  to  poor  folk;  for  my  Aunt  Chausson, 
who  used  to  pick  up  pins  when  she  saw  them  on  the 
floor,  and  quite  right,  too,  for  we  ought  not  to  let 
anything  get  lost;  for  kind  Madame  Laroque,  who 
used  to  make  me  jam  sandwiches,  and  for  Navar- 
ino,  her  parrot,  who  once  gave  me  such  a  nip  that 
the  blood  flowed.  She  inquired  whether  my  god- 
father, M.  Danquin,  still  liked  trout  cooked  in  wine 
as  much  as  ever,  and  if  Madame  Caumont  had 
found  a  husband  for  her  eldest  daughter.  While  she 
was  asking  all  these  questions,  without  waiting  for 


LITTLE  PIERRE  253 

them  to  be  answered,  Melanie  had  picked  up  her 
knitting  again. 

"What's  that  you're  making,  Melanie?"  asked  my 
mother. 

"A  woollen  petticoat  for  my  niece." 

"She  keeps  dropping  stitches  and  never  picks  them 
up,"  said  the  niece,  with  a  shrug  and  without  low- 
ering her  voice.  "She  keeps  getting  it  narrower  and 
narrower.  It's  wool  thrown  away." 

M.  Denizot,  having  taken  off  his  working  boots, 
now  came  in  and  saluted  the  company. 

"Madame  Noziere,"  said  he,  "you  may  be  sure 
the  old  soul  wants  for  nothing." 

"She  costs  us  a  pretty  penny,"  added  Madame 
Denizot. 

I  watched  her  as  she  knitted  her  petticoat,  a 
little  grieved  for  her  sake  that  it  was  wool  thrown 
away.  She  had  only  one  glass  in  her  spectacles,  and 
that  was  cracked  in  three  pieces.  This,  however, 
did  not  seem  to  trouble  her. 

We  chatted  like  old  friends,  but  we  had  not  a 
great  deal  to  say  to  each  other.  She  was  over- 
flowing with  maxims,  and  instilled  into  me  that  one 
should  respect  one's  father  and  mother,  never  waste 
a  piece  of  bread,  and  learn  what  was  necessary 
to  play  one's  part  in  life.  All  this  bored  me. 
Giving  a  turn  to  the  conversation,  I  told  her  that 
the  elephant  was  dead  and  that  a  rhinoceros  had 
come  to  the  Jardin  des  Plantes. 


254  LITTLE  PIERRE 

Thereupon  she  began  to  laugh  and  said: 

"I  can't  help  laughing  when  I  think  of  Madame 
Sainte-Lucie  at  whose  house  I  used  to  be  in  service 
when  I  was  a  young  girl.  One  day  she  went  to  see 
the  rhinoceros  at  the  fair,  and  asked  a  fat  man 
dressed  up  like  a  Turk  whether  he  was  the  rhino- 
ceros. 'No,  madame,'  answered  the  fat  man,  Tm 
the  man  what  shows  it.' ' 

She  next  spoke — I  don't  remember  what  brought 
it  up — of  the  Cossacks  who  came  to  France  in  1815. 
And  she  told  me  over  again  the  story  she  had  told  me 
times  without  number,  during  our  walks  in  the  old 
days. 

"One  of  those  blackguardly  Cossacks  tried  to  kiss 
me.  I  wouldn't  let  him,  and  nothing  in  this  world 
would  have  made  me  do  it.  My  sister  Celestine  told 
me  to  be  careful  as  they  had  the  upper  hand  of  us, 
and  that  if  I  rebuffed  them  like  that  they  might  set 
fire  to  the  village  out  of  spite.  And  in  fact  they 
were  a  vindictive  lot.  All  the  same  I  didn't  let  my- 
self be  kissed." 

"Melanie,  would  you  have  pushed  away  the  Cos- 
sack like  that  if  you  had  been  sure  that  he  would 
set  fire  to  the  village  if  you  did?" 

"I  would  have  pushed  him  away  if  my  father  and 
mother,  my  uncles,  aunts,  nephews,  nieces,  broth- 
ers and  sisters,  Monsieur  le  Maire,  Monsieur  le 
Cure,  and  all  the  people  had  been  burnt  in  their 


LITTLE  PIERRE  255 

houses,  and  all  the  cattle  and  all  the  stock  into  the 
bargain." 

"They  were  very  ugly,  weren't  they,  Melanie, 
those  Cossacks?" 

"Oh,  yes  I  They  had  flat  noses,  slit  eyes,  and  goat 
beards.  But  they  were  tall  and  strong,  and  the  one 
who  wanted  to  kiss  me  was  a  fine  specimen  of  his 
tribe,  a  big  strapping  fellow.  He  was  one  of  the 
leaders." 

"And  they  were  very  wicked  men,  the  Cossacks?" 

"Oh,  yes  I  If  any  harm  came  to  one  of  their 
number,  they  would  lay  waste  the  whole  country 
round  with  fire  and  sword.  People  used  to  go 
and  hide  in  the  woods.  The  Cossacks  were  al- 
ways saying  Capout,  and  made  signs  that  they  would 
cut  off  our  heads.  We  had  to  be  very  careful  not 
to  thwart  them  when  they  had  been  drinking  brandy, 
for  then  they  used  to  go  raving  mad,,  and  struck 
at  every  one  within  reach,  regardless  of  age  or  sex. 
When  they  were  short  of  victuals  they  shed  tears 
at  having  left  their  country,  and  some  few  among 
them  used  to  perform  on  an  instrument  like  a  small 
guitar  and  played  such  melancholy  tunes  that  it 
nearly  broke  your  heart  to  listen  to  them.  My 
cousin,  Niclausse,  killed  one  of  them  and  threw  the 
body  into  a  well,  but  no  one  got  to  know  of  it.  We 
put  up  a  dozen  of  them  at  the  farm.  They  drew 
water,  carried  wood,  and  minded  the  children." 


256  LITTLE  PIERRE 

I  had  heard  these  tales  many  and  many  a  time. 
They  always  interested  me. 

While  we  were  alone  with  Melanie,  my  mother 
slipped  a  little  piece  of  gold  into  her  hand,  and  I 
saw  the  poor  old  thing  tremble  as  she  clutched  it  and 
she  hid  it  in  her  apron  with  such  an  expression  of 
greed  and  fear  as  it  pained  me  to  behold.  Was  this 
then  that  same  Melanie  who  used  to  take  pennies  out 
of  her  own  pocket,  unknown  to  my  mother,  in  order 
to  buy  me  sweets? 

However,  the  old  soul  regained  her  equanimity, 
and  resumed  her  flow  of  talk.  Smilingly  she  re- 
called the  pranks  I  used  to  play  her.  She  told  how 
I  drove  her  nearly  crazy  by  putting  her  brooms 
where  she  could  not  find  them,  or  by  concealing  heavy 
weights  in  her  basket  when  she  was  getting  ready  to 
go  shopping.  She  was  merry  and  seemed  to  have 
thrown  off  the  weight  of  years.  At  this  point  it  came 
into  my  head  to  say: 

"And  your  saucepans,  Melanie,  the  saucepans 
which  you  kept  so  bright  and  which  you  thought  so 
much  of?" 

As  she  thought  of  them  Melanie  sighed  deeply 
and  big  tears  coursed  down  her  wrinkled  cheeks. 

The  table  was  laid  for  my  mother  and  me  in  the 
bedroom,  which  smelt  of  linen  freshly  washed.  The 
walls  were  whitewashed,  and,  ranged  along  by  the 
looking-glass  on  the  mantelpiece,  were  a  couple  of 
daguerreotypes  of  Monsieur  and  Madame  Denizot, 


LITTLE  PIERRE  257 

and  an  old  fencing  master's  diploma  festooned  with 
tricolour  flags.  I  wanted  them  to  let  my  old  nurse 
come  and  have  her  lunch  with  us.  But  the  farmer's 
wife  said  that  her  aunt  had  lost  all  her  teeth,  that 
she  ate  very  slowly,  that  she  was  accustomed  to  have 
her  meals  in  the  kitchen  by  herself,  and  that  if  we 
had  her  beside  us  at  table  she  would  not  feel  at  her 
ease. 

I  made  a  very  good  lunch,  a  savoury  omelet,  the 
wing  of  a  chicken  and  a  piece  of  cheese.  I  drank  a 
nip  of  new  wine,  and  my  mother  bade  me  go  and 
take  a  look  round  the  farm. 

The  sun  was  beginning  its  downward  course  and 
was  breaking  its  spears  of  fire  upon  the  peaceful  foli- 
age of  the  trees.  Thin,  white  clouds  hung  motionless 
in  the  heavens.  Larks  were  singing  low  down  over 
the  fields.  A  strange  light-heartedness  took  posses- 
sion of  my  soul.  The  influence  of  Nature  stole  in 
upon  my  being  through  the  portal  of  every  sense, 
and  a  delicious  eagerness  set  me  all  aglow.  I 
shouted,  I  bounded  along  beneath  the  lofty  trees,  I 
was  drunk,  visited  with  that  frenzy  which  I  recog- 
nized later  on  when  I  came  to  read  those  Greek 
poets  who  sang  of  the  dances  of  the  Maenads.  Like 
them  I  danced,  and,  dancing,  waved  a  thyrsus  torn 
from  a  stripling  hazel.  Trampling  on  grass  and 
flowers,  inebriated  with  the  fresh  air  and  the  scent 
of  the  woods  and  fields,  whipped  by  yielding  twigs, 
I  sped  along  like  a  wild  thing. 


258  LITTLE  PIERRE 

My  mother  called  me  and  pressed  me  to  her 
bosom. 

"Pierrot,"  she  said,  with  a  trace  of  anxiety  in 
her  voice,  "you're  in  a  bath  of  perspiration.  How 
hot  your  forehead  is,  and  how  your  heart  is  beat- 
ing!" 


CHAPTER  XXXI 

PIERRE'S  FIRST  ENCOUNTER  WITH  THE  ROMAN 
WOLF 

ELL,  at  all  events,"  said  my  mother, 
"he  can't  always  be  left  to  moon 
about  from  morning  till  night  with 
Justine." 

"Reading  whatever   he   happens 
to  lay  hands  on,"  said  my  father. 
Yesterday  I  discovered  him  deep  in  a  treatise  on 
obstetrics." 

They  decided  to  send  me  to  school. 
After  a  great  deal  of  looking  about,  my  father 
found  a  place  to  suit  me,  an  educational  establish- 
ment under  clerical  control,  and  attended  by  the  sons 
of  gentlemen.  These  were  two  essentials  in  the 
eyes  of  my  parents,  who  had  leanings  towards  re- 
ligion and  the  aristocracy.  Not  wishing  to  part  with 
their  only  son,  they  did  not  make  a  boarder  of  me, 
and  for  that  I  entertain  feelings  of  gratitude  towards 
them  that  will  cease  only  with  my  life.  However,  to 
send  me  to  school  for  two  hours  in  the  morning 
and  then  again  for  two  hours  in  the  afternoon  they 
deemed  neither  possible  nor  desirable.  My  mother 
was  suffering  at  that  time  from  heart  trouble,  and 
Justine,  having  all  the  cooking  and  housework  on 

259 


26o  LITTLE  PIERRE 

her  hands,  really  had  not  the  time  to  go  backwards 
and  forwards  twice  a  day  to  take  me  all  the  way  to 
school.  They  were  also  afraid  that,  without  the 
master's  eye  upon  me,  I  might  be  tempted  to  scamp 
my  homework.  The  apprehension  was  not  without 
foundation,  for  I  should  not  have  been  very  eager  to 
devote  myself  to  improving  my  mind  with  study, 
what  time  Justine  was  in  her  kitchen  making  ready, 
to  enact  her  flood-and-fire  performance,  or  doing 
battle  in  the  dining-room  with  Moses  and  Spartacus. 
In  order  that  I  might  not  be  cut  off  from  my  own 
folk,  and  also  that  I  might  be  subjected  to  the  neces- 
sary discipline,  I  was  sent  as  a  day-boarder.  Justine 
had  to  make  it  her  business  to  take  me  to  St.  Joseph's 
at  eight  o'clock  in  the  morning  and  fetch  me  again 
at  four  in  the  afternoon. 

St.  Joseph's  school  was  housed  in  a  mansion  in 
the  Rue  Bonaparte,  an  old  building  with  an  aristo- 
cratic air  about  it. 

I  will  not  go  so  far  as  to  say  that  I  took  in  the 
beauty  of  its  style,  or  that  I  appreciated,  at  its  due 
worth,  the  noble  stone  staircase  with  its  wrought  iron 
balusters,  and  the  great  rooms  whose  whiteness  was 
tempered  by  the  shadowy  green  reflected  from  the 
trees  without,  the  rooms  in  which  M.  Grepinet  held 
his  classes.  My  uncultured  taste  rather  prompted 
me  to  admire  the  chapel  with  its  coloured  statue  of 
the  Virgin,  its  vases  of  paper  flowers  under  their 


LITTLE  PIERRE  261 

glass  globes,  and  its  gilt  lamp  suspended  from  a 
blue  star-spangled  firmament. 

As  this  establishment  was  a  preparatory  school 
for  the  College  X.  it  was  not  like  the  lycees  where 
the  little  boys  are  victimized  by  the  big  ones  after 
the  manner  of  minnows  and  pike  in  lakes  and  riv- 
ers. Being  all  very  young,  all  equally  strengthless, 
and  as  yet  but  little  advanced  in  iniquity,  we  did  not 
unduly  tyrannize  over  one  another.  The  masters 
were  mild-mannered  men;  the  childish  simplicity  of 
the  ushers  was  a  bond  between  ourselves 
and  them.  In  short,  though  I  did  not  greatly 
enjoy  myself  in  this  house,  I  was  not  a  prey 
to  those  fits  of  sadness  that  were  destined, 
later  on,  to  cast  a  gloom  over  my  school  life. 
Opining  that  Mademoiselle  Merelle  had  taught 
me  enough  French,  they  enrolled  me  in  the  second 
form  and — though  I  never  learned  the  reason  why — 
put  me  with  the  boys  who  knew  a  certain  amount 
of  grammar  and  had  been  through  the  Epitome. 
But,  then,  is  it  always  so  easy  to  find  out  why  the 
authorities  act  as  they  do,  whether  in  public  or  in 
private  matters?  In  the  days  when  I  passed  under 
the  ferule  of  M.  Grepinet,  there  flourished  a  philos- 
opher with  a  kindly  eye  and  long  drooping  mous- 
taches whose  name  was  Victor  Considerant.  I  had 
seen  him  scores  of  times  fishing  with  a  line  beneath 
the  Pont  Royal,  and  he  was  then  giving  out  to  the 
world,  on  the  authority  of  Fourier,  his  master,  that 


262  LITTLE  PIERRE 

mankind  would  enjoy  the  benefits  of  a  good  govern- 
ment, when  they  found  themselves  in  harmony,  thai, 
is  to  say,  in  a  state  regulated  in  every  detail  by  Vic- 
tor Considerant  himself.  When  that  time  comes, 
no  little  animal  as  ignorant  as  I  was  will 
be  put  into  M.  Grepinet' s  class,  and  the  con- 
dition of  the  human  race  will  be  ameliorated  in 
many  other  respects.  We  shall  only  do  what  we 
have  a  mind  to  do.  Like  the  baboons  we  shall  have 
a  tail  wherewith  to  suspend  ourselves  from  the  trees, 
and  an  eye  at  the  tip  of  that  tail.  This  at  any  rate 
was  the  account  my  godfather  used  to  give  of  the 
phalansterian  philosophy.  Meantime,  things  go  on 
pretty  much  as  they  used  to  in  my  young  days,  and, 
taking  them  all  round,  schoolboys  fare  no  better  and 
no  worse  than  little  Pierre  Noziere. 

My  master,  then,  was  called  Grepinet.  I 
see  him  now,  as  he  sat  there  in  front  of  me. 
Endowed  by  nature  with  a  big  nose  and  a 
thick  drooping  underlip,  he  resembled  Lorenzo 
di  Medici,  not  on  account  of  the  laxity  of 
his  morals  but  the  ugliness  of  his  features.  This 
was  borne  in  upon  me  when  I  saw  the  medals  of 
Lorenzo  the  Magnificent.  If  medals  of  M.  Grep- 
inet were  obtainable,  the  only  difference  between 
them  and  Lorenzo's  would  be  the  price  we  should 
have  to  pay  for  them.  The  likenesses  would  be 
the  same.  M.  Grepinet  was  a  very  worthy  man,  un- 
less I  am  greatly  mistaken,  and  an  excellent  form- 


LITTLE  PIERRE  263 

master.  It  was  assuredly  not  his  fault  that  I  de- 
rived small  profit  from  his  lessons.  The  first  one 
enchanted  me.  As  I  listened  to  the  voice  of  M. 
Grepinet,  I  beheld  visions  of  delight  rise  up  as  if 
by  magic  from  a  book  that  to  me  was  more  unde- 
cipherable than  the  most  recondite  of  hieroglyphics. 
It  was  the  De  Viris.  A  shepherd  discovered,  among 
the  reeds  of  the  Tiber,  a  pair  of  new-born  babes  to 
whom  a  she-wolf  was  giving  suck.  He  bore  them  to 
his  hut,  where  his  wife  took  charge  of  them  and 
brought  them  up  as  shepherd  boys,  unwitting  that 
the  blood  of  gods  and  kings  flowed  in  their  veins. 
I  beheld  them  all  as,  one  after  another,  the  master's 
voice  summoned  them  forth  from  the  dim  recesses 
of  the  text,  all  those  heroes  of  the  wondrous  tale, 
Numitor  and  Amulius,  kings  of  Alba  Longa,  Rhea 
Silvia,  Faustulus,  Acca  Laurentia,  Romulus  and 
Remus.  I  was  occupied,  heart  and  soul,  with  the 
story  of  their  adventures.  The  music  of  their  names 
rendered  them  beautiful  in  my  sight.  When  Justine 
came  to  take  me  home,  I  told  her  all  about  the  twins 
and  the  she-wolf  which  suckled  them ;  I  recounted  to 
her  the  whole  story  which  I  had  just  learned  and 
which  she  would  have  listened  to  more  attentively 
had  not  her  equanimity  been  disturbed  by  a  bad  two- 
franc  piece  which  the  coal  man  had  contrived  to 
palm  off  on  her  that  very  day. 

The  De  Viris  gave  me  some  further  delights.    I 
fell  in  love  with  the  nymph  Egeria  who,  in  a  grotto 


264  LITTLE  PIERRE 

beside  a  fountain,  inspired  Numa  with  wise  laws. 
But  soon  I  had  the  whole  crowd  of  Sabines,  Etrus- 
cans, Latins  and  Volscians  on  my  hands,  and  they 
were  more  than  I  could  tackle.  And,  then,  if  my 
French  was  small  my  Latin  was  nil.  One  day  M. 
Grepinet  put  me  on  to  construe  a  passage  in  this 
obscure  De  Viris,  something  about  the  Samnites.  I 
showed  myself  totally  incapable  of  performing  the 
task,  and  was  reprimanded  before  the  whole  class. 
I  thereupon  conceived  a  mortal  disgust  for  the  De 
Vins  and  the  Samnites.  Nevertheless,  my  soul  was 
filled  with  wonder  when  I  remembered  Rhea  Silvia 
on  whom  a  god  bestowed  two  children  who  were 
taken  from  her  and  suckled  by  a  wolf  amid  the  rushes 
of  the  Tiber. 

The  superior,  M.  1'Abbe  Meyer,  was  attractive 
by  reason  of  his  gentleness  and  distinguished  appear- 
ance. I  still  remember  him  as  a  prudent,  affectionate 
and  motherly  sort  of  man. 

He  used  to  dine  in  the  refectory  at  eleven  o'clock 
with  all  the  boys,  and  ate  his  salad  with  his  fingers. 
I  do  not  say  this  in  order  to  defame  his  memory. 
In  his  young  days,  that  used  to  be  quite  the  correct 
thing.  My  Aunt  Chausson  assured  me  that  my 
uncle  never  ate  his  lettuce  in  any  other  way. 

The  Director  often  came  to  see  us  while  M. 
Grepinet  was  taking  his  class.  He  signed  to  us,  as  he 
entered,  to  keep  our  seats  and,  then,  passing  along  in 
front  of  the  desks,  he  examined  each  boy's  work.  I 


LITTLE  PIERRE  265 

did  not  notice  that  he  paid  less  attention  to  me  than 
to  my  richer  or  more  aristocratic  fellow  pupils.  He 
spoke  to  us  with  a  graciousness  that  was  especially 
noticeable  when  he  had  occasion  to  find  fault  with  us, 
and  his  reproaches  did  not  crush  our  spirits.  He  did 
not  magnify  our  faults,  he  did  not  question  our  good 
intentions.  His  admonitions  were  as  innocent  and 
slight  as  the  delinquencies  which  provoked  them. 
He  told  me  one  day  that  I  wrote  like  a  cat.  The 
comparison  was  a  novel  one  to  me  and  it  sent  me 
off  into  fits  of  laughter,  which  became  more  than  ever 
uncontrollable  when,  in  order  to  show  me  how  to 
form  one's  letters,  he  picked  up  my  pen  that  only 
had  half  a  nib  to  it,  and  wrote  like  a  cat  indeed. 

From  that  day  forth  M.  le  Directeur  never  once 
passed  by  my  desk  without  enjoining  me  to  look 
after  my  pens,  not  to  dig  them  right  down  into  the 
inkpot,  and  always  to  wipe  them  when  I  had  done 
with  them. 

"A  pen  ought  to  last  a  long  time,"  he  added  one 
day.  "I  know  of  a  great  scholar  who  only  used  one 
pen  to  write  a  whole  book  as  big  as — "  And  cast- 
ing his  eye  round  the  bare  room  he  spread  out  his 
arms  and  indicated  the  great  red  marble  chimney- 
piece. 

I  was  lost  in  wonderment. 

A  little  while  afterwards,  as  I  was  walking  with 
Justine  along  the  Rue  du  Vieux-Colombier,  I  noticed, 
in  a  yard  in  front  of  an  antique  dealer's,  a  stone  saint 


266  LITTLE  PIERPJE 

so  huge  that  his  head  reached  up  to  the  first  floor 
windows.  He  was  writing  in  a  book  as  big  as  a 
mantelpiece,  with  a  pen  to  match.  I  informed  my 
nurse  that  he  was  the  friend  of  M.  le  Directeur,  and 
she  thought  that  well  he  might  be. 

If  happiness  did  not  regularly  dwell  with  me, 
ecstasy  was  an  occasional  visitor.  It  frequently  hap- 
pened  to  me  to  become  drunk  with  all  the  movement 
and  noise  that  went  on  in  the  playground  during  one 
of  the  after-dinner  breaks.  In  play  as  in  work  I 
could  not  put  up  with  rules.  I  did  not  care  about 
those  geometrical  games  such  as  prisoner's  base 
which  had  to  be  played  strictly  according  to  rule. 
Their  exactitude  bored  me.  They  did  not  seem  to 
me  to  give  a  picture  of  life.  I  liked  the  games  de- 
tested by  mothers,  the  games  that  the  ushers  used 
to  put  a  stop  to  sooner  or  later  because  of  the  dis- 
order they  involved,  games  without  rule  or  restraint, 
rough,  furious  games,  full  of  horror. 

Now,  on  that  day,  at  the  usual  signal,  we  swarmed 
out  into  the  playground.  Hangard,  our  leader,  who 
lorded  it  over  us  all  by  reason  of  his  lofty  stature, 
his  big  voice,  and  his  masterful  disposition,  stood  up 
on  a  stone  seat  and  held  forth. 

Hangard  stammered,  but  he  was  eloquent.  He 
was  an  orator,  a  leader  of  men;  there  was  some- 
thing of  the  Camille  Desmoulins  in  his  composition. 

"Look  here,  you  kids,"  said  he,  "aren't  you  sick 
to  death  of  playing  'puss  in  the  corner'  and  'leap- 


LITTLE  PIERRE  267 

frog'?  Let's  have  a  change.  Let's  play  at  'Rob- 
bing the  Coach.'  I'll  show  you  how.  It'll  be  jolly 
fine.  You  see  if  it  won't." 

We  answered  him  with  acclamations  and  shouts 
of  joy.  Suiting  the  action  to  the  word,  Hangard  or- 
ganized the  game.  His  genius  was  equal  to  every- 
thing. In  a  trice  the  coach  horses  were  put  to,  the 
postilions  cracked  their  whips,  the  robbers  armed 
themselves  with  knives  and  blunderbusses,  the  pas- 
sengers strapped  up  their  luggage  and  filled  their 
purses  and  their  pockets  with  gold.  The  gravel  in 
the  playground  and  the  lilac  bushes  that  enclosed  the 
garden  of  M.  le  Directeur  furnished  the  necessary 
accessories.  Off  we  went.  I  was  a  passenger  and 
one  of  the  humblest;  but  my  heart  thrilled  at  the 
beauty  of  the  landscape  and  the  perils  of  the  road. 
The  robbers  were  lying  in  wait  for  us  in  the  gorge 
of  a  fearful  mountain — to  wit  the  glass  roof  of  the 
steps  leading  up  into  the  parlour.  The  onslaught 
was  swift  and  terrible.  The  postilions  were  knocked 
off  their  horses.  I  was  bowled  over,  pounded  with 
blows,  buried  under  a  heap  of  corpses.  Standing 
erect  on  this  human  mountain,  Hangard  made  a  re- 
doubtable fortress  of  it.  Twenty  times  the  robbers 
swarmed  up  it,  twenty  times  they  were  hurled  back 
again.  I  was  beaten  to  a  mummy;  knees  and  elbows 
scraped  raw,  the  tip  of  my  nose  incrusted  with  little 
bits  of  sharp  grit,  lips  torn,  ears  aflame — never  had 
I  drunk  in  such  delight.  When  the  school  bell  rang 


268  LITTLE  PIERRE 

and  broke  in  upon  my  dream,  my  heart  was  rent  in 
twain.  All  the  time  M.  Grepinet  was  giving  us  our 
lesson,  I  sat  dazed  and  devoid  of  feeling.  My  nose 
was  smarting,  my  knees  burning;  but  I  liked  the  sen- 
sation because  it  recalled  that  crowded  hour  of  glori- 
ous life.  M.  Grepinet  asked  me  several  questions 
which  I  was  unable  to  answer.  He  called  me  a  don- 
key, which  was  the  more  painful  to  me  inasmuch  as, 
not  having  read  the  Metamorphoses,  I  was  as  yet 
unaware  that  I  only  had  to  munch  roses  in  order  to 
recover  my  humanity.  Learning  it  subsequently, 
when  I  had  reached  man's  estate,  I  have  lounged  at 
leisure  through  the  groves  of  Wisdom,  feeding  my 
donkey  nature  on  the  roses  of  science  and  medita- 
tion. I  have  devoured  whole  bushes,  with  their  per- 
fume and  their  thorns,  but  above  my  human  head 
there  would  ever  be  pricking  the  tiniest  tip  of  a 
pointed  ear. 


CHAPTER  XXXII 

BUTTERFLY  WINGS 

VERY  time  I  go  into  the  Pare  de 
Neuilly  I  am  reminded  of  Clement 
Sibille,  the  gentlest  soul,  as  it  seems 
to  me,  of  any  that  I  ever  saw 
skimming  the  surface  of  this  terres- 
trial globe.  He  was,  I  think,  near- 
ing  the  end  of  his  tenth  year  when  I  first  made  his 
acquaintance.  I  was  a  year  older  than  he,  but  the 
superiority  which  my  age  gave  me  over  him  I 
wantonly  threw  away  by  my  faults.  The  fates  only 
suffered  me  to  catch  a  momentary  glimpse  of  him; 
yet  now,  though  so  many  years  have  rolled  by,  I 
still  seem  to  see  him  amid  the  foliage,  through  the 
railings,  whenever  I  go  into  the  Pare  de  Neuilly. 

Monsieur  and  Madame  Sibille  had  a  house  there, 
and  in  the  summer  I  used  to  go  with  my  father  and 
mother  to  spend  a  few  hours  with  them  of  a  Sunday 
afternoon.  Madame  Sibille,  whose  Christian  name 
was  Hermance,  was  pale,  slim  and  supple  of  limb. 
With  her  green  eyes,  prominent  cheek-bones  and 
small  chin,  she  gave  one  a  tolerably  close  impres- 
sion of  a  cat  that  had  been  metamorphosed  into  a 
woman,  with  some  of  the  characteristics  of  her  for- 
mer nature  still  clinging  about  her.  Isidore  Sibille, 

269 


270  LITTLE  PIERRE 

her  husband,  was  an  elongated,  dismal  looking  per- 
son, and  resembled  a  stork.  It  was  thus  that  the 
couple  appeared  to  my  father,  who,  after  the  manner 
of  Lavater,  used  to  amuse  himself  by  seeking  in 
human  countenances  a  likeness  to  members  of  the 
animal  kingdom.  From  these  resemblances  he  would 
deduce  notions  as  to  their  character  and  tempera- 
ment, but  so  vague  and  rash  were  his  conclusions  that 
I  should  be  hard  put  to  it  to  say  precisely  what  he 
derived  from  these  semblances  of  bird  and  cat.  All 
I  know  about  M.  Sibille  is  that  he  was  manager  of  a 
big  French  cashmere  factory.  I  have  heard  my 
mother  say  that  the  Empress  Eugenie  sometimes 
wore  these  cashmeres  for  the  sake  of  encouraging 
home  industries,  and  that  this  was  one  of  the  most 
unwelcome  duties  that  could  devolve  upon  a  sov- 
ereign, so  painful  were  these  cashmeres  to  behold. 
It  was  observed  that  Hermance  herself  always  re- 
frained from  wearing  them. 

The  Sibilles'  house,  in  the  Pare  de  Neuilly,  was  a 
white  one,  flanked  by  a  turret.  In  front,  a  flight  of 
steps  led  up  from  a  beautiful  lawn  in  the  middle  of 
which  was  a  fountain  surrounded  by  a  stone  basin. 
It  was  here,  on  the  garden  paths,  that,  frail  and 
seemingly  ever  about  to  take  flight  heavenward, 
there  first  dawned  on  my  view  Clement  Sibille.  His 
eyes  were  of  a  limpid  blue,  his  complexion  a 
dazzling  white,  his  features  of  extraordinary  deli- 
cacy. His  fair  hair  was  cut  very  close  to  his  round 


LITTLE  PIERRE  271 

head,  but  his  ears,  so  far  from  lying  back  against  the 
temporal  bone,  were  at  right  angles  to  it,  and  stuck 
out  on  either  side  of  his  head  like  a  couple  of  flags 
that  by  a  curious  freak  of  nature  were  so  shaped  as 
to  resemble  the  wings  of  a  butterfly.  They  were 
transparent  and,  when  the  light  shone  through  them, 
took  on  colours  of  pink  and  carmine,  and  glowed 
with  dazzling  hues.  You  did  not  realize  that  they 
.  were  big  ears;  you  thought  you  were  looking  at 
miniature  wings.  At  all  events  that  is  the  picture  my 
memory  conjures  up.  Clement  was  very  pretty,  but 
he  was  odd. 

"Clement's  got  butterfly's  wings,"  I  said. 

And  my  mother  answered: 

"Painters  and  sculptors  portray  Psyche  after  the 
same  fashion  with  butterfly  wings,  and  Psyche  was 
taken  to  wife  by  Eros  and  admitted  into  the  as- 
sembly of  the  gods  and  goddesses." 

One  more  learned  than  I  in  mythological  lore 
might  have  retorted  that  Psyche  did  not  wear  her 
wings  at  the  side  of  her  head  in  the  place  where  her 
ears  ought  to  be. 

Clement  was  an  unsubstantial  fairy  thing.  He  pro- 
gressed by  little  leaps,  not  in  a  direct  line  but  cast- 
ing himself  from  side  to  side  as  though  he  were 
the  sport  of  the  winds.  The  simplicity  of  his  amuse- 
ments, his  childish  ways,  and  the  infantile  awkward- 
ness of  his  movements,  were  in  pathetic  contrast 
with  the  kindness  of  his  disposition,  which  was  of 


272  LITTLE  PIERRE 

a  strength  and  a  manly  staunchness  that  seemed  to 
suggest  a  person  of  riper  years.  His  soul  was  as 
transparent  and  pure  as  his  complexion,  as  serene 
and  untroubled  as  his  expression.  He  spoke  but 
little  and  always  affectionately.  He  never  com- 
plained, though  he  had  perpetual  reason  to  complain. 
Diseases  were  only  too  ready  to  seek  a  lodging 
within  his  puny  frame,  and  scarlet  fever,  typhoid, 
measles,  whooping  cough  followed  each  other  in 
rapid  succession.  And  perhaps  a  malady  then  but 
little  understood,  tuberculosis,  had  gained  access  to 
his  narrow  chest.  Even  when  illness  allowed 
him  a  respite,  Fate  did  not  let  him  off.  He  met  with 
accidents  so  extraordinary  in  their  nature  and  so 
frequent  in  their  occurrence,  that  it  seemed  as  though 
some  invisible  power  were  cunningly  devising  means 
to  persecute  him.  But  all  these  misfortunes  redounded 
to  his  advantage  in  that  they  afforded  him  opportu- 
nities to  display  his  unalterable  gentleness.  He  was 
for  ever  slipping,  stumbling,  tripping  in  every  con- 
ceivable and  inconceivable  manner,  butting  into  every 
wall,  pinching  his  fingers  in  every  door,  so  that  he 
was  perpetually  growing  fresh  nails.  He  cut  him- 
self sharpening  his  pencils,  he  got  a  bone  in  his 
throat  from  every  fish  that  lake,  pond,  brook, 
stream,  river  or  sea  produced  for  him  and  that  Mal- 
vina,  the  Sibilles'  cook,  prepared  for  his  nourish- 
ment. His  nose  would  begin  to  bleed  just  as  he  was 
going  to  see  Robert  Houdin  or  to  have  a  donkey-ride 


LITTLE  PIERRE  273 

in  the  Bois  de  Boulogne  and,  despite  the  key  they  put 
down  the  back  of  his  neck,  He  would  stain  his  new 
waistcoat  and  his  beautiful  white  knickerbockers. 
One  day — I  saw  the  thing  happen  before  my  very 
eyes — he  was  whirling  round  and  round  on  the  lawn, 
when  he  went  and  tumbled  right  into  the  fountain. 
Being  afraid  lest  he  should  take  a  chill  or  get  a  cold 
on  the  chest,  his  people  did  everything  they  could 
think  of  to  warm  him  up;  I  saw  him  in  bed  with  a 
monster  eiderdown  on  the  top  of  him,  a  baby's  bon- 
net on  his  head,  and  a  seraphic  smile  on  his  coun- 
tenance. When  he  saw  me  he  begged  my  pardon  for 
leaving  me  all  alone  with  nothing  to  do. 

I  had  no  brother,  no  playmate  with  whom  to  com- 
pare myself.  When  I  beheld  Clement,  I  discovered 
that  Nature  had  bestowed  on  me  a  restless  spirit, 
tumultuous  longings,  a  heart  fulfilled  of  vain  desire 
and  unreasoning  sorrow.  Nothing  availed  to  mar 
the  tranquillity  of  his  soul.  If  I  failed  to  learn  from 
him  that  whether  we  are  happy  or  unhappy  depends 
on  ourselves  alone,  I  only  had  myself  to  blame.  But 
I  was  deaf  to  lessons  on  good  conduct.  Well  had 
it  been  for  me  had  I  not  provided,  in  contrast  to 
good  little  Clement,  the  very  type  of  a  child  who 
loved  rough  play,  a  harum-scarum  mischievous  ur- 
chin. Such  a  child  was  I,  and  as  such  the  world  con- 
sidered me.  Must  I  plead,  in  my  own  justification, 
that  my  actions  were  ordered  by  that  mysterious 
power,  that  dread  Necessity,  who  imposes  her  laws 


274  LITTLE  PIERRE 

alike  on  gods  and  men  and  who  governed  my  ac- 
tions even  as  she  governs  the  universe.  Am  I  to 
plead  that  it  was  the  love  of  Beauty  that  inspired 
me  then  even  as  it  has  inspired  me  all  the  days  of 
my  life,  whereof  it  has  been  alike  the  torment  and 
the  joy.  Wherefore  should  I  do  so?  When  was 
a  man  ever  judged  by  the  canons  of  natural  philos- 
ophy and  the  laws  of  aesthetics.  But  let  me  state  the 
facts. 

One  autumn  afternoon  Clement  and  I  were 
given  leave  to  go  for  a  walk  by  ourselves  on  the 
boulevard  in  front  of  the  Sibilles'  house.  This  boule- 
vard was  not  then  disfigured  by  long  lines  of  monot- 
onous railings  shutting  off  the  gardens.  It  was  more 
countrified  in  those  days,  more  mysterious,  and  more 
beautiful.  Dead  leaves  floated  down  from  the  tall 
trees  like  flakes  of  light  and  strewed  the  ground 
beneath  our  feet.  Clement  was  skipping  along  a  few 
paces  in  front  of  me,  and  I  noticed  that  his  black 
cloth  cap  trimmed  with  dark  red  braid,  an  ugly 
shaped,  ugly  coloured  thing,  came  right  down  over 
his  pretty  little  golden  curls  and  pressed  back  the 
wonderful  appendages  that  served  him  for  ears.  I 
did  not  like  that  cap.  I  was  ill  advised  enough  not 
to  keep  my  eyes  off  it,  and  the  thing  got  more  and 
more  on  my  nerves.  At  last  I  could  stand  it  no 
longer,  and  I  asked  my  companion  to  take  it  off. 
Doubtless  he  regarded  the  request  as  unreasonable, 
since  he  did  not  trouble  to  reply  but  serenely  con- 


LITTLE  PIERRE  275 

tinued  his  pirouetting.  Again  I  told  him  peremp- 
torily to  remove  his  cap. 

Taken  aback  at  my  persistence,  he  mildly  in- 
quired: 

"Why?" 

"Because  it's  ugly." 

He  thought  I  was  jesting,  but  all  the  same  he  kept 
an  eye  on  me,  and  when  I  tried  to  pull  it  off  he  re- 
sisted my  attempt  and  pressed  his  cap  down  on  his 
head  with  care  and  caution,  for  he  loved  his  cap 
and  deemed  it  a  thing  of  beauty.  Twice  more  I  es- 
sayed to  gain  possession  of  the  odious  headgear. 
Each  time  he  pressed  it  farther  down  on  his  head 
and  made  it  more  odious  still.  Thus  foiled,  I  sus- 
pended my  attacks,  but  I  had  a  dodge  at  the  back 
of  my  mind.  His  pretty  face,  whereon  was  written 
a  look  of  pained  surprise,  soon  recovered  its  habitual 
expression  of  tranquil  innocence.  How  could  I  have 
failed  to  be  touched  by  his  look  of  unsuspecting 
trust?  Alas,  the  spirit  of  violence  was  within  me. 
Watching  my  opportunity,  I  suddenly  rushed  at  him, 
laid  hold  of  the  cap,  and  sent  it  flying  over  the  wall 
into  Louis  Philippe's  park. 

Clement  said  not  a  word,  he  uttered  not  a  cry. 
He  just  looked  at  me  with  wondering,  reproachful 
eyes  that  cleft  my  heart  in  twain,  and  his  eyes  glis- 
tened with  tears.  I  stood  there  as  though  trans- 
fixed, unable  to  realize  that  I  had  done  so  criminal 
a  deed,  and  on  the  winged  and  curly  head  of  Clement 


276  LITTLE  PIERRE 

I  still  sought  the  form  of  that  ill-fated  cap.  It  was 
there  no  more ;  it  had  vanished  beyond  recall.  The 
wall  was  very  high,  the  park  vast  and  deserted.  The 
sun  was  near  to  setting.  Fearful  lest  Clement  should 
catch  cold  or,  rather,  distressed  at  the  sight  of  his 
bare  head,  I  covered  it  with  my  own  Tyrolese  hat, 
which  descended  right  over  his  eyes  and  dismally 
bent  down  his  ears.  In  silence  we  made  our  way 
back  to  the  Sibilles'  house.  I  need  not  describe  the 
reception  I  got. 

That  was  the  last  time  my  parents  took  me  to 
call  on  their  Neuilly  friends.  I  never  saw  Clement 
again.  Poor  little  person,  he  soon  afterwards  van- 
ished from  this  world.  His  butterfly  wings  waxed 
larger  and  larger,  and,  when  they  were  strong  enough 
to  bear  him,  he  flew  away.  His  grief-stricken  mother 
essayed  in  vain  to  follow  him.  The  kindly  gods 
metamorphosed  her  into  a  cat,  and,  uttering  her 
doleful  plaint,  she  looks  for  him  over  the  house- 
tops. 


CHAPTER  XXXIII 

A  DIGRESSION 

HAVE  already  used  up  a  good  deal 
of  paper  with  these  recollections  of 
my  early  days,  but  I  have  just  found, 
tucked  away  in  a  corner  of  my  mem- 
ory, something  my  mother  said 
about  me  when  I  was  quite  a  little 
boy.  One  day  she  was  going  to  take  me  for  a  walk, 
and  she  spent  what  seemed  to  me  an  eternity  in  get- 
ting ready.  When  at  last  she  appeared,  looking  so 
nice  and  so  happy,  I  glanced  at  her  sullenly,  so  at 
least  I  am  told,  and  declared  that  I  would  not  go 
for  that  walk,  or  for  any  other  walk,  and  that  I 
renounced  all  the  pleasures  and  all  the  good  things 
of  this  world,  from  that  day  forth  and  for  ever- 
more. 

"Oh,  dear  I  What  a  temper  the  child  has,"  sighed 
my  mother. 

I  did  not  think  it  was  quite  right  of  her  to  say 
that,  in  spite  of  what  had  led  up  to  it.  It  is  true 
that  when  I  came  to  examine  myself  in  comparison 
with  my  well  behaved  little  friend  whom  the  gods 
changed  into  a  butterfly,  I  freely  recognized  that  I 

was  not  gentle,  not  placid  as  he  was.    And,  to  be 

277 


278  LITTLE  PIERRE 

quite  frank  about  it,  my  desires  being  more  ardent 
than  those  of  most  children,  I  capitulated  more 
promptly  to  Necessity.  From  my  earliest  years, 
Reason  exercised  a  potent  sway  over  me.  That 
means  that  I  was  an  exceptional  creature,  for  it  is 
not  the  case  with  the  majority  of  my  kind.  Of  all 
the  ways  of  defining  man,  I  think  the  worst  is  the 
one  which  makes  him  out  to  be  a  reasoning  animal. 
It  is  no  great  boast  on  my  part  to  set  myself  up 
as  a  being  endowed  with  a  larger  share  of  reason 
than  most  of  those  whom  I  have  met  or  heard  about. 
Reason  rarely  dwells  in  common  minds  but  still  more 
rarely  in  great  ones.  I  say  "reason,"  and  if  you 
inquire  in  what  sense  I  employ  the  term,  I  reply 
in  the  everyday  sense.  If  I  attached  a  metaphysical 
signification  to  it,  I  should  not  know  what  I  meant 
myself.  I  apply  the  same  meaning  to  it  as  old  Mela- 
nie,  who  did  not  know  her  letters.  I  call  a  rea- 
sonable man  a  man  who  makes  his  own  particular 
mind  so  to  square  with  the  mind  universal  that  he 
is  never  unduly  surprised  at  anything  that  happens, 
and  manages  to  accommodate  himself  to  circum- 
stances more  or  less  successfully.  I  call  that  man 
reasonable  who,  observing  the  lack  of  order  that  ex- 
ists in  the  natural  world  and  the  folly  of  mankind, 
does  not  persist  in  talking  of  the  order  of  the  one, 
and  the  wisdom  of  the  other.  In  a  word,  I  call  him 
reasonable  who  does  not  make  too  self-conscious  an 
effort  to  appear  so. 


LITTLE  PIERRE  279 

I  fancy  I  was  such  a  one.  But,  upon  my  word, 
when  I  come  to  think  about  it,  I  don't  know,  and  I 
don't  want  to  know.  An  unbeliever  in  the  wisdom 
of  the  Delphic  oracle,  far  from  endeavouring  to 
know  myself,  it  has  been  my  constant  endeavour  to 
do  the  very  opposite.  I  hold  the  knowledge  of  one- 
self to  be  a  source  of  care,  anxiety  and  distress. 
I  have  had  as  little  commerce  as  possible  with  my- 
self. It  seemed  to  me  that  wisdom  lay  in  turning 
away  from  the  contemplation  of  oneself,  in  forget- 
ting one's  own  existence,  or  in  imagining  oneself  to 
be  different,  by  nature  and  fortune,  from  what  one 
really  is.  Know  not  thyself;  that  is  the  beginning 
of  wisdom. 

If  it  be  true  that  Montaigne  composed  his  Es- 
says in  order  to  study  his  own  personality,  his  re- 
searches must  have  caused  him  more  anguish  than 
the  stones  which  rent  his  kidneys.  I  think,  on  the 
contrary,  that  he  wrote  his  book  to  distract  his 
thoughts  from,  rather  than  to  concentrate  them  on, 
the  contemplation  of  his  own  individuality. 

And  let  it  not  be  said  that  this  sermon  on  self- 
forgetfulness  is  singularly  out  of  place  in  a  book 
where  the  writer's  self  is  his  sole  theme.  I  am  a 
different  person  from  the  child  I  am  writing  about. 
We  have  nothing  in  common  now,  not  a  grain  of 
substance,  not  a  grain  of  thought.  Now  that  he 
has  become  a  total  stranger,  I  am  enabled  to  find 


280  LITTLE  PIERRE 

in  his  company  some  relief  from  my  own.  I,  who 
neither  hate  nor  love  myself,  love  him.  It  is  pleas- 
ant to  live  over  again  in  thought  the  days  he  lived. 
The  very  air  of  these  present  times  is  painful  to 
breathe. 


CHAPTER  XXXIV 

THE  COLLEGIAN 

T  was  the  first  day  of  term.  I  had 
spent  a  certain  length  of  time  at 
St.  Joseph's,  where  I  used  to  con- 
strue the  Epitome  to  an  accompani- 
ment of  twittering  sparrows,  and 
I  was  now  to  attend  the  college 
as  a  day  boy. 

I  was,  then,  a  collegian.  I  felt  the  honour,  but 
with  some  anxiety,  for  I  feared  it  would  be  a  weighty 
one.  I  hadn't  the  slightest  wish  to  cut  a  brilliant 
figure  on  those  ink-stained  forms,  and  when  I  was 
ten  I  had  no  ambitions.  And,  furthermore,  I  had 
no  hopes.  At  the  preparatory  school  I  had  been 
noted  for  a  perpetual  look  of  wonderment,  and, 
rightly  or  wrongly,  that  is  not  regarded  as  a  mark 
of  very  great  intelligence.  I  was  indeed  looked  upon 
as  just  a  little  simple.  That  was  an  injustice.  I 
was  as  intelligent  as  the  majority  of  my  comrades, 
but  I  was  intelligent  in  a  different  manner.  Their 
intelligence  served  them  in  the  ordinary  circum- 
stances of  life;  mine  only  came  to  my  aid  in  the  rarer 
and  more  unlooked-for  conjunctures.  It  manifested 

itself  unexpectedly  in  wanderings  far  afield  or  in  a 

281 


282  LITTLE  PIERRE 

liking  for  reading  things  out  of  the  ordinary  run.  I 
had  given  up  the  idea  of  distinguishing  myself  in 
class,  and  from  the  day  I  entered  the  college  I  set 
about  getting  what  distraction  I  could  out  of  my 
new  surroundings.  Such  was  my  nature  and  my  bent, 
and  I  have  never  changed.  I  have  always  known 
how  to  amuse  myself.  For  me,  that  comprised  the 
whole  art  of  living.  Little  and  big,  young  and 
old,  I  have  always  lived  as  far  as  possible  away 
from  myself  and  away  from  the  tristful  reality  of 
things.  And  so,  on  this  first  day  of  term,  I  was  con- 
scious of  a  desire  to  escape  from  my  environment 
that  was  all  the  keener  because  that  environment 
struck  me  as  peculiarly  uninviting.  The  college  was 
ugly,  dirty,  and  evil-smelling,  my  classmates  disagree- 
able and  the  masters  depressing.  Our  form  mas- 
ter looked  at  us  without  enthusiasm  and  without  af- 
fection, and  he  was  neither  sufficiently  sensitive  nor 
sufficiently  insincere  to  put  on  the  semblance  of  a 
regard  which  he  did  not  feel.  He  did  not  harangue 
us.  He  merely  surveyed  us  for  a  moment,  and  then 
asking  us  our  names,  entered  them,  as  we  called  them 
out,  in  a  big  register  that  lay  open  on  his  desk.  I 
thought  him  old  and  machine-like,  but  I  daresay  he 
was  not  as  old  as  I  thought  him.  When  he  had 
taken  down  our  names,  he  ruminated  on  them  for 
some  time  in  silence,  so  as  to  assimilate  them  thor- 
oughly. I  believe  that  he  got  hold  of  them  all  im- 
mediately. He  had  learnt  from  experience  that  a 


LITTLE    PIERRE  283 

master  has  no  hold  on  his  boys,  unless  he  is  familiar 
with  their  names  and  faces. 

"  I  will  call  out  the  names  of  the  books  you  will 
need  and  which  you  must  get  as  quickly  as  you  can," 
he  said. 

Thereupon  he  proceeded  to  enumerate  in  monoto- 
nous drawling  tones  a  number  of  forbidding  titles 
such  as  lexicons  and  rudiments  (why  cannot  these 
things  be  introduced  to  little  children  by  more  at- 
tractive names?),  the  Fables  of  Phaedrus,  and  arith- 
metic, a  geography,  the  Selects  e  Profanis,  and  so 
on  and  so  forth.  And  then  he  wound  up  with  some- 
thing I  had  never  heard  of  before:  Esther  and 
Athalie. 

Forthwith  there  arose  before  my  eyes,  in  a  sort 
of  blissful  haze,  two  graceful  female  figures,  attired 
as  one  sees  in  pictures,  their  arms  encircling  each 
other's  waist,  exchanging  words  that  I  could  not 
hear,  but  that  I  divined  were  full  of  grace  and 
charm.  The  master,  and  the  master's  chair,  the 
blackboard,  the  drab  walls,  had  all  disappeared. 
The  two  women  were  walking  slowly  along  a  narrow 
path  through  fields  of  wheat  a-bloom  with  corn- 
flowers and  poppies,  and  their  names  fell  like  music 
on  my  ears :  Esther  and  Athalie. 

I  knew,  without  being  told,  that  Esther  was  the 
elder.  She  had  a  kind  heart.  Athalie,  who  was 
not  so  tall,  had,  as  far  as  I  could  make  out,  fair 
hair  hanging  down  in  plaits.  They  dwelt  in  the 


284  LITTLE  PIERRE 

country.  I  seemed  to  descry  a  hamlet,  thatched 
roofs  with  smoke  curling  upwards,  a  shepherd,  and 
villagers  joining  in  the  dance.  But  all  the  features 
in  the  picture  remained  undefined,  and  I  was  all 
eagerness  to  learn  what  happened  to  Esther  and 
to  Athalie.  The  master  calling  out  my  name  rudely 
dispelled  my  dreams. 

"Are  you  going  to  sleep?  You're  wool-gather- 
ing. Come,  now,  pay  attention  and  take  down  what 
I  tell  you." 

The  master  began  to  call  out  the  homework  for 
the  next  day.  There  was  a  Latin  exercise  to  be 
done,  and  one  of  Fenelon's  fables  to  prepare. 

When  I  got  home,  I  gave  my  father  the  list  of 
books  which  I  was  supposed  to  get  as  soon  as  pos- 
sible. My  father  quietly  read  it  through  and  told 
me  I  must  obtain  the  books  from  the  college  bursar. 

"By  so  doing,"  he  said,  "you  will  get  the  edition 
adopted  by  your  masters  and  used  by  most  of  the 
other  boys  in  your  form;  same  text,  same  notes. 
That  will  be  far  the  best  way." 

And  he  gave  me  back  the  list. 

"But,"  said  I,  "how  about  Esther  and  Athalie?' 

"Well,  my  boy,  the  bursar  will  give  you  Esther 
and  Athalie  when  he  gives  you  the  other  books." 

I  was  disappointed.  I  should  have  liked  to  have 
Esther  and  Athalie  right  away.  I  counted  on  get- 
ting a  deal  of  pleasure  therefrom.  I  kept  hovering 
round  the  table  where  my  father  was  busy  writing. 


LITTLE  PIERRE  285 

"Papa,  Esther  and  Athalie?" 

"Don't  waste  your  time.  Get  on  with  your  work 
and  leave  me  alone." 

I  wrote  out  my  Latin  exercise,  squatting  on  one 
heel.  I  did  it  without  relish  and  I  did  it  badly. 

During  dinner  my  mother  put  several  questions  to 
me  regarding  the  masters,  the  other  boys,  and  the 
classes. 

I  told  her  that  my  master  was  old  and  dirty,  that 
he  blew  his  nose  like  a  trumpet,  and  that  he  was 
always  strict  and  sometimes  unfair.  As  for  the  boys, 
some  I  praised  up  to  the  skies,  others  I  as  inordi- 
nately decried.  I  had  no  feeling  for  the  finer  shades, 
and  I  was  unwilling  as  yet  to  recognize  the  all-per- 
vading mediocrity  of  men  and  things. 

"It's  nice,  isn't  it,  Esther  and  Athalie?"  I  inquired 
of  my  mother  all  of  a  sudden. 

"Very  nice;  but  they  are  two  plays,"  replied  my 
mother. 

I  looked  so  blank  as  she  said  this  that  my  excel- 
lent mother  deemed  it  behoved  her  to  explain  the 
matter  with  great  precision. 

"They  are  two  separate  plays,  dear,  two  trage- 
dies; Esther  is  one  play,  Athalie  is  another." 

Thereupon,  with  great  seriousness,  calmness,  and 
determination,  I  said: 

"They're  not." 

My  mother  in  amazement  asked  me  how  I  could 
contradict  her  in  such  a  rude,  silly  manner. 


286  LITTLE  PIERRE 

I  persisted  in  my  denial,  and  said  that  they  Were 
not  two  plays.  Esther  and  Athalie  was  a  single 
story,  and  I  knew  it.  Esther  was  a  shepherdess. 

"Very  well,  then,"  said  my  mother.  "It  is  an 
Esther  and  Athalie  I  know  nothing  about.  You 
must  let  me  see  the  book  in  which  you  have  read  this 
story." 

I  maintained  a  gloomy  silence  for  some  moments, 
and  then  with  a  heart  overflowing  with  bitterness 
and  melancholy  I  said  again: 

"I  tell  you  that  Esther  and  Athalie  are  not  two 
plays." 

My  mother  was  endeavouring  to  convince  me, 
when  my  father  angrily  told  her  to  take  no  notice 
of  me  if  I  persisted  in  being  so  opinionated  and 
pigheaded. 

"He's  taken  leave  of  his  senses,"  he  added. 

And  my  mother  heaved  a  sigh.  I  saw — I  see  it 
still — her  bosom  rise  and  fall  beneath  the  black  taf- 
feta bodice  that  was  fastened  at  the  neck  with  a  little 
gold  brooch  in  the  shape  of  a  knot,  with  two  little 
trembling  tassels  dangling  from  it. 

Next  morning,  at  eight  o'clock,  Justine,  my  maid, 
took  me  to  school.  I  had  some  cause  for  misgiv- 
ing. My  Latin  exercise  did  not  satisfy  me  and 
seemed  to  me  very  unlikely  to  satisfy  anybody  else. 
The  mere  look  of  it  betokened  a  scamped  and  a 
faulty  piece  of  work.  The  writing,  which  was  care- 
ful and  fine  enough  to  begin  with,  got  rapidly  worse 


LITTLE  PIERRE  287 

as  it  went  on,  and  finally  degenerated  into  an  un- 
gainly scrawl.  But  I  rammed  my  anxiety  well  down 
into  the  obscure  depths  of  my  being.  I  drowned  it. 
When  I  was  ten  I  was  wise  at  least  on  one  point. 
I  deemed  it  useless  to  repine  over  the  irreparable, 
and  thought  that,  as  Malherbe  says,  we  ought  not 
to  seek  a  remedy  for  an  irremediable  misfortune, 
to  repent  a  fault  being  merely  adding  to  one  evil 
another  more  grievous  still.  We  must  forgive  our- 
selves a  deal  of  things  if  we  would  accustom  our- 
selves to  forgiving  others.  Thus  I  forgave  myself 
my  Latin  exercise.  As  I  passed  by  the  grocer's 
shop,  I  caught  sight  of  some  candied  fruits  gleaming 
in  their  boxes  like  gems  in  a  white  velvet  jewel-case. 
The  cherries  were  rubies,  the  angelica  emeralds,  the 
plums  giant  topazes,  and  since,  of  all  the  senses,  it 
is  sight  that  procures  me  the  strongest  impressions, 
the  view  of  them  straightway  seduced  me,  and  I 
bewailed  the  lack  of  means  that  prevented  me  from 
acquiring  one  of  those  boxes.  The  smallest  was 
one  and  threepence.  If  repentance  held  no  sway 
over  me,  desire  has  ruled  the  whole  course  of  my 
life.  I  may,  indeed,  say  that  my  life  has  been  one 
prolonged  desire.  I  love  desire;  I  love  the  joys  and 
pangs  of  desire.  To  desire  with  ardour  is  almost 
like  to  possession.  Nay — what  am  I  saying? — it  is 
possession,  without  satiety  or  disgust.  Nevertheless, 
can  I  aver  with  confidence  that,  when  I  was  a  child 
of  ten,  I  thus  philosophized  about  desire,  and  that  I 


288  LITTLE  PIERRE 

held  these  tenets  in  their  complete  and  finished  form? 
I  would  not  stake  my  life  on  that;  nor  am  I  pre- 
pared to  swear  that,  in  after  years,  the  sting  of  de- 
sire has  not  sometimes  been  so  keen  as  to  cause  me 
pain  beyond  endurance.  Well  had  it  been  for  me  had 
I  never  set  my  heart  on  anything  but  boxes  of  candied 
fruits. 

I  used  to  live  on  the  friendliest  terms  with 
Justine.  I  was  affectionate,  she  was  lively.  I  loved 
her  without  feeling  that  I  was  loved  by  her  in  re- 
turn, a  thing  which,  if  the  truth  must  be  told,  is  a 
little  foreign  to  my  character. 

That  morning  we  were  walking  along  on  our  way 
to  the  college,  each  holding  on  to  the  strap  of  my 
satchel  and  giving,  now  and  again,  little  sudden 
sharp  tugs  that  might  have  pulled  us  over  if  we 
had  been  less  firm  on  our  feet.  As  a  rule,  I  handed 
on  to  Justine  all  the  harsh  and  even  insulting  things 
that  had  been  said  to  me  during  the  day.  I  ques- 
tioned her  on  difficult  subjects,  even  as  I  myself 
had  been  questioned.  She  either  did  not  answer 
or  else  she  answered  wrong,  and  I  said  to  her 
what  I  had  had  said  to  me :  "You  are  an  ass.  You 
shall  have  a  bad  mark.  Aren't  you  ashamed  of  your 
laziness?"  Thus  it  happened  that  on  that  particu- 
lar morning,  I  asked  her  whether  she  knew  Esther 
and  Athalie. 

"Esther  and  Athalie,  mon  petit  monsieur?  But 
those  are  just  names." 


LITTLE  PIERRE  289 

"Justine,  you  deserve  to  be  kept  in  for  answering 
like  that." 

"They  are  names,  mon  petit  maitre.  Natalie  is 
my  foster-sister's  name." 

"I  daresay  it  is,  but  you  haven't  read  the  story 
of  Esther  and  Athalie.  No,  you  haven't  read  it. 
Well,  I  am  going  to  tell  it  you." 

And  I  told  it: 

"Esther  was  a  farmer's  wife  at  Jouy-en-Josas. 
One  day,  as  she  was  walking  in  the  country  she 
came  across  a  little  girl  who  had  fainted  from  weari- 
ness by  the  roadside.  She  brought  her  round,  gave 
her  some  bread  and  some  milk,  and  asked  her 
name." 

I  continued  the  narrative  until  we  reached  the  col- 
lege gates.  And  I  was  sure  that  the  story  was  true, 
and  that  I  should  find  it  set  down  exactly  like  that 
in  my  book.  You  ask  how  I  arrived  at  that  con- 
clusion. I  cannot  say.  But  I  was  quite  sure  of  it. 
This  day  was  not  at  all  memorable.  My  exer- 
cise went  through  unnoticed,  and  disappeared  ob- 
scurely like  the  great  multitude  of  human  actions 
which  hurry  by  into  the  darkness  and  leave  no 
memory  behind  them.  Next  morning  I  found  my- 
self possessed  with  a  mighty  enthusiasm  for  Binet. 
Binet  was  a  little  thin  person  with  sunken  eyes,  a 
big  mouth,  and  a  grating  voice.  He  wore  little 
black  patent-leather  boots  with  white  stitching.  He 
dazzled  me.  The  universe  melted  away  before  my 


290  LITTLE  PIERRE 

eyes;  I  beheld  but  Binet.  I  can  discover  no  reason 
for  my  enthusiasm  when  I  come  to  look  back  over 
the  matter  now,  except  those  same  patent-leather 
boots,  which  spoke  so  eloquently  of  the  pride  and 
elegance  of  a  bygone  day.  If  you  deem  the  reason  a 
trifling  one,  then  I  say  that  the  history  of  man  will 
for  ever  remain  a  sealed  book  to  you.  When  we 
speak  of  the  Greeks,  are  they  not  essentially  known 
to  us  as  the  well-greaved  Greeks? 

The  next  day,  Wednesday,  was  a  holiday, 
and  it  was  not  until  the  Thursday  that  we  got 
our  books  from  the  bursar.  He  made  us  sign 
a  receipt  which  gave  us  a  great  idea  of  our  im- 
portance as  members  of  the  civil  community.  We 
inhaled  our  books  with  delight.  They  smelt  of 
paper  and  glue.  They  were  quite  new.  We  wrote 
our  names  on  the  title  page.  Some  of  us  made  a 
blot  on  the  cover  of  a  grammar,  maybe,  or  a  dic- 
tionary, and  were  exceeding  sorrowful.  Neverthe- 
less, it  was  fated  that  these  books  were  to  receive 
inkstains  more  numerous  than  the  splashes  of  mud 
on  the  windows  of  the  grocer's  shop  in  the  Rue  des 
Saints-Peres  in  winter.  The  first  stain  was  dread- 
ful; the  others  followed  as  a  matter  of  course.  These 
considerations  suggest  a  train  of  thought  which,  if 
pursued,  would  carry  us  far  from  grammars  and 
dictionaries.  For  my  part,  I  searched  forthwith  in 
my  packet  of  books  for  Esther  and  Athalie.  How- 
beit,  by  a  stroke  of  ill-fortune  which  wounded  me  to 


LITTLE  PIERRE  291 

the  quick,  that  work  was  lacking.  I  spoke  to  the 
bursar  about  it.  He  said  that  I  need  not  worry,  that 
I  should  have  it  all  in  good  time. 

It  was  not  until  a  fortnight  later,  All  Souls'  Day, 
that  I  got  Esther  and  Athalie.  It  was  a  little  volume 
bound  in  boards  and  backed  with  blue  linen.  A  grey 
paper  label  on  the  cover  gave  the  title  as  follows: 
Racine,  Esther  and  Athalie,  Tragedies  Founded  on 
Holy  Writ  and  Edited  for  the  Use  of  Schools.  That 
title  boded  nothing  good  in  my  eyes.  I  opened  the 
book.  It  was  worse  than  the  gloomiest  forebodings 
could  have  suggested.  Esther  and  Athalie  were  po- 
etry. Now  every  one  knows  that  things  written  in 
poetry  are  hard  to  understand  and  uninteresting. 
Esther  and  Athalie  were  two  separate  plays  and  all 
in  verse,  and  long  verses,  at  that.  Alas,  my  mother's 
words  had  come  too  cruelly  true !  So  Esther  was  not 
a  farmer's  wife,  and  Athalie  was  not  a  little  beggar 
maiden.  Esther  had  not  come  upon  Athalie  by  the 
wayside.  So  I  had  been  dreaming.  And  what  a 
charming  dream!  And  how  dismal  and  wearisome 
the  reality  compared  with  my  reverie!  I  shut  the 
book  and  vowed  I  would  never  open  it  again.  I  did 
not  keep  my  word. 

O  great  and  tender-hearted  Racine !  best  and  dear- 
est of  poets !  in  such  wise  did  I  first  make  acquaint- 
ance with  you.  You  are  now  my  love  and  my  delight. 
In  you  lies  all  my  happiness,  my  dearest  joy.  It 
was  little  by  little,  as  I  went  forward  in  life,  slowly 


292  LITTLE  PIERRE 

gaining  experience  of  men  and  things,  that  I  learned 
to  know  you  and  to  love  you.  Compared  with  you 
Corneille  is  but  a  skilful  rhetorician,  and  I  know  not 
if  even  Moliere  himself  is  so  true  to  life  as  you,  O 
sovereign  master,  with  whom  all  truth  abides,  all 
beauty !  When  I  was  young  and  misled  by  the  pre- 
cepts and  examples  of  those  barbarous  romanticists, 
I  did  not  at  first  perceive  that  you  were  the  pro- 
foundest,  even  as  you  were  the  purest,  of  all  tragic 
poets.  My  eyes  were  not  strong  enough  to  con- 
template your  splendour.  I  have  not  always  spoken 
of  you  with  sufficient  admiration.  I  have  neglected 
to  say  that  the  characters  created  by  you  were  the 
truest  that  poet  ever  conjured  forth  into  the  light 
of  day.  I  have  left  it  unrecorded  that  you  were  very 
life  and  very  nature.  You  alone  have  made  real 
women  tread  the  stage.  What  are  the  women  of 
Sophocles  and  Shakespeare  beside  the  women  whom 
you  have  animated  with  the  breath  of  life?  They 
are  but  puppets.  None  but  yours  know  love  and 
desire ;  the  others  do  but  talk.  I  would  not  willingly 
die  without  graving  a  few  lines  at  the  foot  of  your 
monument,  O  Jean  Racine,  in  witness  of  my  love 
and  veneration,  but  if  the  time  to  perform  this  sacred 
duty  be  not  vouchsafed  me,  then  let  these  lines, 
casual  but  sincere,  betoken  what  is  in  my  heart. 

But  wait.  I  have  not  recorded  that,  having  re- 
fused to  learn  Esther's  prayer:  O  mon  souverain 
roi  (the  noblest  lines  in  the  French  language)  my 


LITTLE  PIERRE  293 

form  master  made  me  write  out  fifty  times  the  verb : 
"I  have  not  learnt  my  lesson."  He  was  a  profane 
mortal.  It  is  not  so  that  we  avenge  the  glory  of  a 
poet.  To-day  I  know  my  Racine  by  heart,  and  he  is 
ever  new  to  me.  As  for  you,  old  Richou  (such  was 
my  master's  name),  I  loathe  your  memory.  You 
profaned  the  poetry  of  Racine  when  you  spouted  it 
from  your  thick  lips.  The  sense  of  harmony  was  not 
in  you.  You  deserved  the  fate  of  Marsyas.  I  deem 
that  I  did  well  to  refuse  to  learn  Esther,  so  long  as 
I  was  under  your  sway.  But  you,  Maria  Favart, 
you,  Sarah,  you,  Bartet,  you,  Weber,  may  the  benison 
of  heaven  descend  upon  you,  for  that  you  distilled 
from  your  lips  divine,  like  honey  and  ambrosia,  the 
music  of  Esther,  of  Phedre,  and  of  Iphigenic. 


CHAPTER  XXXV 

MY  ROOM 

BELLAGUET  continued  till  his 
dying  day  to  enjoy  the  esteem 
which  is  the  customary  preroga- 
tive of  prosperous  dishonesty.  His 
grateful  family  bore  him  to  the 
grave  in  solemn  state.  Prominent 
financiers  acted  as  pall-bearers.  Behind  the  hearse, 
the  master  of  the  ceremonies  carried  a  cushion  on 
which  were  displayed  the  insignia  of  the  various 
orders — crosses,  ribbons,  medals  and  badges  and 
stars — that  had  been  granted  to  the  deceased. 

As  the  procession  passed  along,  women  crossed 
themselves,  the  men  in  the  crowd  took  their  hats 
off  and  murmured  under  their  breath  such  words  as 
"sharper,"  "swindler,"  and  "old  rogue,"  reconciling 
in  this  way  their  respect  for  the  dead  with  their  sense 
of  justice. 

Having  entered  into  possession  of  the  deceased's 
estate,  his  heirs  had  several  changes  carried  out  in 
the  house,  and  my  mother  persuaded  them  to  have 
our  flat  rearranged  and  done  up.  By  making  a 
few  alterations  and  doing  away  with  some  dark 

closets  and  cupboards,  they  managed  to  construct  an- 

294 


LITTLE  PIERRE  295 

other  little  room,  which  was  allotted  to  me.  Up  to 
then  I  had  slept  either  in  a  sort  of  slip-room  adjoin- 
ing the  drawing-room  which  was  too  small  for  the 
door  to  be  shut  at  night,  or  else  in  the  dressing-room, 
which  was  already  chock-full  of  furniture.  And  I 
used  to  do  my  homework  on  the  dining-room  table. 
Justine  would  come  and  unceremoniously  interrupt 
my  studies  in  order  to  lay  the  cloth  and  the  substi- 
tution of  plates,  dishes,  knives  and  forks,  for  books, 
paper,  and  writing  materials  was  always  attended  by 
a  breach  of  the  peace.  But  when  I  got  a  room  of 
my  own  I  did  not  know  myself.  A  child  the  day  be- 
fore, I  suddenly  became  a  young  man.  My  ideas 
and  tastes  suddenly  sprang  into  being.  Henceforth, 
I  lived  my  own  life.  I  possessed  an  individual  ex- 
istence. 

The  view  from  my  room  was  neither  pleasant  nor 
extensive.  It  looked  out  on  a  back  yard.  The  wall- 
paper displayed  a  field  of  blue  blossoms  on  a  cream- 
coloured  background.  The  furniture  consisted  of  a 
bed,  two  chairs,  and  a  table.  The  cast  iron  bedstead 
is  worthy  of  being  described  in  some  detail.  It  was 
painted  in  a  colour  that  was  not  selected  with  a  due 
regard  to  the  circumstance  that  the  bed  was  sup- 
posed to  imitate  violet  ebony.  It  was  ornamented 
throughout  in  the  style  of  the  Renaissance,  as  that 
style  was  customarily  interpreted  in  the  days  of 
Louis  Philippe,  and  the  forepart  especially  was  con- 
spicuous for  a  medallion  adorned  with  pearls,  from 


296  LITTLE  PIERRE 

which  there  stood  out  in  relief  a  woman's  head  with 
a  band  round  her  hair.  The  head  and  foot  of  the 
bed  were  embellished  with  figures  of  birds  and  foli- 
age. It  must  be  borne  in  mind  that  all  these  objects, 
the  woman's  head,  the  birds,  and  the  foliage,  were  in 
cast  iron  designed  to  imitate  violet  ebony.  How  my 
poor  mother  ever  came  to  buy  such  a  thing  was  a 
cruel  mystery  that  I  never  had  the  courage  to 
fathom.  At  the  foot  of  the  bed  was  a  strip  of  carpet 
with  a  pattern  representing  some  little  children  play- 
ing with  a  dog.  On  the  walls  hung  water-colour 
drawings  of  Swiss  women  in  national  costume.  Be- 
sides the  articles  of  furniture  already  mentioned, 
there  were  a  set  of  shelves  on  which  I  used  to  put 
my  books,  a  walnut  cabinet,  and  a  little  Louis  XVI 
rosewood  table  that  I  would  gladly  have  exchanged 
for  my  godfather's  roll-top  mahogany  desk,  which, 
in  my  estimation,  would  have  made  me  look  more 
important. 

As  soon  as  I  got  a  room  to  myself,  I  began  to  live 
a  life  of  my  own;  I  was  conscious  of  an  inward  ex- 
istence. I  became  capable  of  reflexion,  of  retiring 
into  my  own  soul.  As  for  my  room,  I  did  not  look 
on  it  as  beautiful.  I  never  thought  for  a  moment 
that  it  ought  to  be.  Nor  did  I  think  it  ugly.  I  just 
looked  upon  it  as  unique,  incomparable.  It  fenced 
me  about  from  the  universe,  and  within  it  I  found 
the  universe  again. 

It  was  there  that  my  mind  was  formed,  there  that 


LITTLE  PIERRE  297 

it  broadened  out  and  began  to  people  itself  with 
phantoms.  Poor  little  room  of  my  childhood  days, 
it  was  within  your  four  walls  that  there  began  slowly 
to  gather  round  me  the  many  hued  shadows  of 
knowledge,  all  those  illusions  that  have  hidden 
nature  from  my  sight  and  gathered  more  and  more 
densely  between  myself  and  her  as  I  increased  my 
efforts  to  unveil  her  mystery.  It  was  there,  within 
your  four  narrow  walls,  with  their  garlands  of  blue 
flowers,  that  there  appeared  to  me,  at  first  faint  and 
far-off,  the  terrifying  simulacra  of  Love  and  Beauty. 


THE   END 


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